Breaking Up is Easy
by cinkie68
Summary: Malec. Post canon. Slightly AU. What might have happened if the breakup was longer and Alec had time to move on a bit, while Magnus is completely devestated by it still. This is the story of how they would make their way back to each other. Might have some of the other pairings in it. Rated M for violence, adult language and content.
1. Chapter 1

"What?!" I positively bellowed into the intercom. It was half passed 11 on a Saturday night. I had accepted some clients earlier that day and although I hadn't been taking on much work lately, I was already sick of it. I was just getting ready to go veg out in front of the TV, so whatever 'emergency' spell this person needed was going to have to wait.

"Bro, let me up." Answered an amused and slightly accented voice. Damn. It was Pablo, High Warlock of Queens, loyal to a fault, and part-time pain in my ass. He was also one of the only people I could stomach talking to lately. Go figure.

At that moment, though, I didn't answer him. There I was, rattling around in my rattiest clothing (okay, maybe they used to belong to a certain blue eyed shadowhunter, but what he'd left in my apartment was fair game, right?) moping on a night that was just made for partying. This had, unfortunately, become my new normal. But I didn't have time to dwell on that since I had Pablo to deal with, who was pressing the buzzer non-stop.

"If you're here to talk about my feelings again, you can just shove off. And stop abusing my poor buzzer, you ass."

Pablo responded with an easy laugh, "Well let me up, Magnus, and I'll stop pushing your buttons, boo."

I considered leaving him out there, but I knew that his knack for persistence wouldn't allow him to leave me alone. He would either keep buzzing until I gave in or forced his way in magically. To be sure, Pablo was probably the only being who could possibly succeed in using force to get in since I have my place warded pretty heavily against everyone except him.

Yes, Pablo was annoying, but its probably only because he had been looking out for me. I haven't really been taking care of myself since Alec… And damn, now I was thinking about him again… But really, what else was new?

I decided to take the path of least resistance and buzzed Pablo up. He had just started to ring the bell in the tune of something that sounded suspiciously like that new Lady Gaga song. I unlocked my door and headed to the bathroom to grab some aspirins that I would surely need to make it through this visit.

Pablo was sitting at my table with a bottle of whiskey and two shot glasses. His eyes narrowed when I walked into the kitchen with my pills. "Bro, get your clothes and your face on, we're going out," He said, as if going out was something we did every weekend. He used to come to my epically fabulous parties, but I didn't go out with him on a regular basis.

"Oh are we?" I asked dryly. "What's the alcohol for?" I wasn't at all curious, but I asked anyway, just to speed the conversation along.

"For shots" Pablo looked at my blank expression. "To drink while we get you all prettied up. Now come on hot stuff, get ready."

"And if I refuse."

"I will stay here all night drinking myself stupid and we'll continue that conversation about your feelings that I know you are dying to get back to." Pablo had the gall to smile toothily as he said this.

"Fine." I groaned, knowing Pablo never made empty threats. I was not in any mood to talk, but maybe I needed to get out of my apartment. I was sure my cat wouldn't mind. Chairman Meow had actually been avoiding me for the past few days; he probably wasn't used to me being in his face all of the time. And I was always trying to get him to cuddle with me while I watched TV all day. But I had offered to let him watch Animal Planet, so...

"Don't forget to shower," Pablo called as I walked slowly to my bedroom. I heard him mumble something about being able to smell me from the kitchen table. I couldn't help but crack a tiny smile. Pablo had a way of knowing how to make me feel better, if only a bit.

* * *

An hour and a half and several shots of whiskey later, we were making our way to some club in Queens that I'd never heard of. I had taken my time to get ready, but I wasn't exactly magnificent, at least not in the way that others have come to expect of me. I had on some black skinny jeans and a deep purple muscle shirt. I had washed and conditioned my hair, which, it seems, I hadn't done in days. Really, I hadn't been paying much attention to hygiene lately. (Possibly another reason the Chairman didn't want to socialize with me.) My hair was back to being shiny, though. I didn't bother with any spikes or glitter, though, because what was the point? I wasn't looking to impress anyone tonight. The last thing I had done before leaving was my makeup. I slapped on some eyeliner to my lower lash lines, coated my upper lashes with brown mascara, and doused my lips in clear lip gloss. Definitely an understated look for me.

We pulled up at the club. There were people lined up down the block, waiting to get in. Pablo paid the cabbie as I walked to join the back of the line.

"When have you ever waited in a line?" Pablo scoffed at me. "Come on, hot stuff." He led me around to a back door where he greeted a bouncer like an old friend. We got right in.

I don't know what Pablo had in mind, but I made a beeline for the bar. By the time my companion found me I was already halfway through a Pina Colada. "So you dragged me out to a mundie club?" I asked him.

"Um yeah… Less complications this way." Pablo replied. He sat down next to me and ordered a beer.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

Pablo sighed. "Look Magnus, I'd rather just let you have a good time tonight and talk about this tomorrow, or something, but... Some downworlders have been questioning you recently."

"Questioning me?" I screeched incredulously. I gave myself a moment to allow my voice to return to normal. "I haven't been that bad, have I?"

"Yes." Pablo looked me in the eye with an expression that would make an overprotective parent proud. "You have been sulking around for months and it is getting worse, not better. It makes it even worse that this is all over a shadowhunter. Don't look at me like that, Magnus. I know you don't want to talk about him. But you do realize that overwhelming majority of the downworld hates shadowhunters, right? They feel like you betrayed them only to played by the guy and tossed aside like trash."

I blinked at him, expressionless. "What a nice fucking speech. Ya know, if this whole warlocking thing doesn't pan out you should totally consider motivational speaking."

"And while you're being sarcastic, I'll be taking this seriously, ya know, like the situation merits." He sighed, taking a heavy gulp of his beer. "Your ear is not exactly to the ground anymore, Magnus. People are talking. You have enemies that have been waiting for decades, centuries even, to find a way to get at you and you just sit there with your sarcasm, daring them to knock on to your narrow ass."

"Is my ass really all that narrow?" I asked him, genuinely concerned.

Pablo smiled a bit, shaking his head. "I have half a mind to slap that pretty little face of yours, but you being single-mindedly worried about your appearance is actually a step in the right direction."

"Whatever." I turned to the bartender and motion for another Pina Colada. "That blonde over there has been trying to get your attention ever since you sat down," I point out.

"Blonde in the little red dress, yeah, she has my attention," Pablo replied, without looking up, but with a gleem in his eye. "She just doesn't know it yet."

"Why don't you head on over before she gets desperate enough to start taking her clothes off." I was only halfway kidding. The poor girl really wanted Pablo to notice her. With good reason, too. Pablo was all kinds of hot and sexy. Everything about him was dark and sweet. His skin was slightly darker than mine, the color of brown sugar. His eyes, the color of molassas. He was also super-muscled with arms all thick and tatted up. The biggest turnoff for me, though, was that he was completely straight. Plus, he was like family to me.

Pablo shocked me out of my reverie and waved at someone across the bar. "Don't look now, but you have an admirer of your own."

So I didn't look.

Pablo sighed. "You know when someone says 'don't look now' it means 'look right this instant'." When I still didn't budge he added, "He's cute. Red-headed, though."

I finally looked up, but only because I was tired of staring at my drink. Okay so the guy wasn't bad looking. He smiled a bit shyly at me as I eyed him. "Hmm."

"Alright Magnus, back in the saddle!" Pablo damn near shouted.

"What?" I laughed, eying him in all his craziness. "I'm just looking. I am no where near ready to date again."

"How about a one night stand? That used to be enough for you."

"You offering, sexy?"

"You wish. I already have a pretty good idea who I'll be leaving with tonight, anyway."

"I don't know. It looks like you've got some stiff competition, now. You are moving entirely too slowly for that one."

"Focus on your own game. There is absolutely no need to sweat my technique, Maggie baby. You could come with me, if you feel the need to get schooled." He paused. "Actually, you should really handle your little fanboy over there. He's practically drooling over you."

"Just go." I sighed. "I might talk to him."

Pablo smirked at me and got up, making his way over to his blonde bombshell, who had been swinging her hips slowly, seductively and checking every few seconds to see if he had been looking at her. I rolled my eyes as he walked straight up to her and whispered something in her ear. Her eyes widened and she smiled, pressing her curvy body into his.

At least someone was going home happy tonight. I looked back across the bar. That red-head was texting someone. I noticed that he was still working on the same drink that he had the last time I'd looked at him. I saw him look up so I looked away. I didn't want to give him the wrong idea. There was no way I was actually going over there to talk to that guy. He was kind of cute, but not enough for me to forget about Alec.

I rolled my eyes at myself this time. There I was thinking about him again. Maybe I should just go for the quick lay. Maybe that would get my mind off of him. And maybe the Clave would start inviting me to Christmas dinner.

I ordered another drink. This time a long island. I texted to order an uber to pick me in 1 hour and then proceeded to alternate my time between people watching and messing around with the apps on my phone. I couldn't find Pablo anymore. I'm sure he was busy somewhere with his club vixen.

My bladder was complaining to me, so I took a trip to the men's room. As I made my way back to my little spot at the bar, stumbling only a little, I noticed someone approaching the red-head. He looked familiar. Too familiar. I was feeling a little more than a little bit tipsy, but I would recognize that boy anywhere.

He didn't see me as I watched him like a hawk. My stomach made its descent, slowly, down to the floor as he smiled at the red-head, inhaling sharply as the guy smiled back. Then they hugged. If there was one thing I could cling to its that they did not kiss. Well not yet, at least. But the hug was bad enough. It lingered like they didn't want to let each other go. Their bodies were in contact, albeit lightly, all the way from their heads to their feet. Their hands rubbed each other's backs. I was absolutely frozen. I don't recall even breathing.

I stayed like that, stuck in that spot, in that position even as they'd broke apart and the newcomer sat down next to the red-head. I must have looked awfully strange because Captain Red was giving me a look. That made Sir-hugs-a-lot look in my direction. And smooth ole me still couldn't move.

Alec (my Alexander) locked eyes with me, his just as wide as mine. For the splittiest of split seconds, he looked guilty, as if I had caught him cheating. Then his expression changed to a mix of awkward and nervousness.

I finally regained control of my motor skills and got up, threw some money down on the bar and turned to leave. I'd just made it outside when I heard Alec calling my name. It sounded so sweet coming from his perfect lips.

I turned. "Why? Why did you come after me?" I asked, confused, looking anywhere but at him.

"I don't really know," He said in a quiet voice. "I guess I just wanted to make sure you would be okay."

I snapped. "Okay, Alexander? Okay?" I fumed. "I have been rotting around my apartment for the past few months and it seems you've been out here whoring it up with mundanes."

Well, his expression changed pretty quickly. "You broke up with me." Alec reminded me heatedly. "And you have refused to talk to me. How long, exactly, did you expect me to pine after you?"

"Hmm. Forever." I answered, crossing my arms over my chest, well aware that I sounded like a petulant child.

Alec narrowed his eyes and looked completely disgusted. "Do not talk to me about forever. That's not something I can give you whether it be in a relationship or pathetically begging you to come back to me." He didn't shout, but his words had a hard edge to them.

I couldn't meet his eyes again because he was right, wasn't he? I was the one who had ended things and I hadn't wanted to hear his sorry excuses. _And_ I was still mad at him. And seeing him out and enjoying himself when I was so damn miserable did something to me. It turned me into a jealous and bitter monster.

"No, you couldn't. But you could have given me way more time than what we had." I shot back at him. "Yeah, I broke us up, but it was you who cut our time short, not me and don't deny it. What we had was damn near perfect." I was shouting and creating a bit of a scene by that time. "And you fucked it up!"

"Near perfect? Maybe, maybe not. We had plenty of things we should have worked on. The sad part is that most of the problems had simple solutions. You just refused to address them, Magnus."

I'm sure we'd made for a strange spectacle; what with me raving like a lunatic, all up in Alec's face and him standing calmly and perfectly still. Cue more raving and lunacy from me.

"Are you trying to say you were right, Alexander? And I was so wrong? Was I so horrible? And you so perfect? Did you have all the answers? Did you think that you loved me more? Hmm? What the hell do you know about love?"

"What do _you_ know about it?" Still so quiet. Still so calm. It was a bit creepy, really.

My eyes widened as I look at him in shock. The shock was quickly replaced by anger. "Why don't you go back to red-head." My words stung as they tripped off my tongue. "He's worried about you. I'm sure you'll be needing to comfort him." I turned away from him.

Alec sighed. "I will." He whispered.

Before I could respond, Alec was speaking again, a bit louder. "Look," he said. "I think you're just shocked to see me like this after all this time. And you're drunk. Just sleep it off and I'm sure you'll go back to forgetting about me again."

I turned around to respond. I guess I took longer than I thought, though. By the time my eyes found Alec he had already gone back to his date (or boyfriend, or whatever) and they were hand in hand.


	2. Chapter 2

**I don't own TMI**

 **I need to clear up a couple things. In this story Magnus never went to Idris and therefore was never taken prisoner by that loser Sebastian. Magnus never got to see how much pain Alec was in. He never to to learn that Alec would fight his way through a demon realm to save him and he never gave Alec his handwritten notes about his life. Everything else is the same, unless I make a note otherwise.**

* * *

I woke up on Sunday morning feeling completely unrested, clammy, and irritable. My head and body were both aching. It was barely morning anymore- 11:52AM- and I was going to be late getting to lunch with my brother and sister. My mind kept wanting to go over the previous night as I hurried around, but I didn't want to let it. That would mean thinking about Magnus and I simply did not want to take up any more brain space on him.

I took the subway to over to Manhattan since it would be faster and cheaper than taking a taxi. When I finally got to Taki's I found Izzy and Jace already seated and eating lunch. I went up to the counter to order my own.

"Well, look who finally decided to show up." Jace drawled as I sat in the booth next to Izzy. He did a double take at me. "Dude, is that a hickey?"

"Where?" I asked, feeling over the skin on my neck as if I could detect a hickey by touching it.

Jace smiled wickedly. "Its plain as day right there above your collar bone."

Izzy was manhandling me, roughly trying to shift the top half of me so that she could check out what Jace was ogling.

I truly didn't remember getting a hickey so I didn't believe them until Izzy shoved a mirror at me and I could see the red monster for myself.

"Well, now we know why you were so ready to be done with hunting last night," Izzy said. "Did you have fun?" She smiled at me.

"I um… I don't know…"

Izzy turned immediately suspicious. "What did you do last night, Alec?"

"I had a date." I said as my meal came and I started to dig in. I resisted the urge to add a 'duh' to the end of my sentence. 'Duhs' are not really my style, but they already knew yesterday that I was planning on going out with someone.

"Wait. You still went out to your date? You couldn't have shown up any earlier than 2AM. And later still unless you didn't mind dripping demon guts all over." Jace said.

"You can actually blame Clary for that." I told Jace pointedly. I could swear that girl was trying to slice me up, too. She had a tendency to always fight towards me, blades coming worryingly close to my person, and her efforts always left demon innards all over me. Never on Jace or Simon or even herself.

"What can I say? I taught her well." Came Jace's cheeky response.

What the hell? "You probably did teach her to do that." I grumbled at him.

"Okay, we're getting off topic, here." Izzy reminded us. "Alec, where did you go with your date at 2 in the morning?"

I sighed, my eyes focused on the table, thinking about what a failure last night turn out to be. "I met him at Luigi's. That club." They both looked stunned. "What? He waited all that time and I didn't want to stand him up."

"But you never go to clubs. Especially not a hot new club that Jace and I couldn't drag you to last weekend." Izzy complained.

Jace had been looking at me funny. "Who'd you go out with? That Joseph guy?"

"His name is James, and no I didn't go out with him."

"Whoever it was must of been special. I mean, you're a prude, and yet you gave this guy the green light to go all vampire on your neck. The last person you let do that was…" Jace trailed off, probably wanting to avoid what was sure to be a sore subject. He must have noticed the guilty look I was trying (and failing) to remove from my features. He asked quietly, "Did you see Magnus last night?"

"I um… Well…" I wetted my lips. "It wasn't planned…"

Izzy gasped. "Alec! I thought you were finally done with him. You were moving on. What the fuck, Alec!"

"Keep your voice down, Isabelle. Damn. I didn't go out with him. He just happened to be at Luigi's. We talked for a few minutes and he left. I stayed there with David." I said, diffusing the situation.

Jace had been staring at me silently for a while. "How do you feel, then."

"Fine." I told him. "What kind of question is that? What do you want from me?"

Jace answered. "Well, do you still have feelings for him?"

I sighed. "You're two for two on dumb questions today. Is that a record?" Jace narrowed his eyes sharply at me. I continued. "If something happened where you and Clary had to break up, like, I don't know, say you two suddenly were made to believe you were brother and sister? Would you still have feelings for her?"

Jace went back to silence. Izzy inhaled sharply. They were, of course, both thinking of how torturous it had been for Jace back when he had believed that Valentine was his father. Of course his feelings for Clary did not and would not just go away.

"How I feel about him doesn't matter anymore. All you guys need to know is that I have moved on and I'm not willing to look back." I said. And it was the truth. It had to be since that was what I had been clinging to and that was what got me through the last several weeks relatively sane. I had been spiraling pretty badly for almost two months after Magnus refused to come back to me, refused to even hear my side of the story.

I had to find a way to get over him, though, I couldn't just wallow. That fact had become perfectly clear to me when I had dragged myself on a demon hunting trip once the guilt of not backing up my siblings and friends on such trips got too overwhelming to bear. I was only going through the motions and Jace had almost gotten killed. I hadn't been paying proper attention and he'd had to work doubly hard to take up for my slack. At the last moment Simon (of all people, the newbie shadowhunter) had noticed the demon creeping up behind Jace, moments away from delivering a deathblow. I was just kind of standing there with my head up my ass, thinking about all the things I wanted to say to Magnus. Once I had fully realized what had happened my mind cleared. I knew that I had to find a way forward, a way past Magnus. I also realized that I was fighting a loosing battle and started to question if it was even a battle that was worth the effort.

I looked at my siblings. I could see that they still had some worry in their faces, but I knew that I wasn't going to convince them of anything just by saying a couple sentences. They would have to see with their own eyes that I was okay and, truthfully speaking, I wasn't quite there yet. I really could only just move in that direction.

I checked my phone and saw I had missed a bunch of messages and calls from David. "Hey guys, lunch was great but I'm late for something."

Izzy lifted her sharply arched eyebrows. "Another date?"

Jace wolf-whistled as I offered them a half-smile. "Maybe."

"Be careful, brother." Izzy said, but she smiled.

"Yeah playboy." Jace grinned.

I shook my head and dropped some bills on the table to cover lunch. I said goodbye to them and headed out.

* * *

An hour later I was back in Queens waiting for David to show up at a small, nearly empty, coffee shop. His text messages had been a little more than concerning so I asked him to meet me. I really wanted for things to well between us. I'd only known David for a couple weeks and I had been dating casually with other guys, but I had felt some actually chemistry with him. He seemed to be a nice guy. Someone who was very easy to be around. In the short time that I'd known him I had spent more of my free time with him than with any other guy. Plus, I had other reasons for wanting to spend time with him.

When David got there, he looked embarrassed for some reason and his gray eyes never quite reached my blue ones. I eyed him closely. His carrot-colored hair was swept up and over the left side of his head. His skin was pale, like mine, and he had a crop of freckles across his nose and cheekbones. He was cute, for sure, but he looked very nervous.

"Alec." David started. "I'm surprised you agreed to see me. I'm so sorry. I wont be surprised if you never want to talk to me again."

"What are you talking about?" I asked, trying to recall last night. The last thing I recalled after Magnus left was going back to the bar with David and ordering shots.

"Oh God. You can't even remember last night can you? You got pretty fucked up. Well, I guess we both did, but you drank sooo much in such a short amount of time. Oh God, I'm rambling." David clamped his mouth shut and looked at me with fear in his eyes.

For some reason I couldn't help but feel annoyed at him. Fucking drama queen. Just spit it out already. "Are you going to tell me what actually happened or do I have to guess?" That made David look even more apprehensive so I dialed it back a bit and reached for his hand. "Sorry, I shouldn't have snapped at you. Just tell me what happened. I don't remember much after those first few shots we had, really."

He proceeded to tell me what happened last night. Apparently I had decided to take 10 shots in a row, while chugging rum and cokes. I knew David was not a big drinker, but I guess he had a couple shots, too. He said my demeanor had changed to something he had never seen in the 2 weeks that he had known me. I was aggressive and challenging him. He said he was sure it must have had everything to do with me seeing my ex. The realization made him get really possessive and he said he yanked me into the bathroom and locked the door and tried to have his way with me.

"So, that's when you gave me the hickey?" I asked. He nodded, still looking ashamed. "What else happened?"

"Well, things got really heated for a while. You let me do things that you never let me do before. I thought we were going to have sex. Then you looked at me like you loved me… I wanted to just go with it at first." He paused again. "You… You called me Magnus and I just kind of lost it."

"What do you mean 'you lost it'?" I asked frowning. Did he try to fight me or something? David was tall, shorter than me though. He wasn't necessarily weak, but I doubted he would be any match for me even in my drunken state.

He gulped, but continued. "I pushed you against the wall and shook you a few times. You didn't fight back for some reason. You just kept telling me to stop. It made me even more mad. I pushed you some more. Then I, um tried to have um sex with you, um, again and-

I dropped his stupid hand out of mine and jumped to my feet. "You tried to fucking rape me?! Is that what you're saying to me right now?" I screeched.

David tried to yank my back into my seat. I shoved him off. How dare he tell me something like that and have the nerve to touch me.

"I was drunk, just like you." David whined pathetically.

"Really? You made it sound like you hadn't had that much." I reminded him, looking into his eyes, trying to discern the truth.

He raked his hand down over his face, destroying his goofy hairstyle. He had really pissing me off and everything that I had found cute about him was starting to look ugly. He hesitated, most likely trying to decide how to word his next sentences. "I was probably more jealous than drunk," he admitted, hurrying on to add, "But I stopped myself. I got you home safely. I'm really sorry…"

I really didn't know how to feel, exactly. I couldn't believe that he would have even come close to doing something like that. That he would let jealousy over an ex cloud his judgement like that. I couldn't take that lightly. "I gotta go. I'll call you later." I said, getting up, not looking at him.

David looked as if he wanted to cry, but he just nodded his head as I left the shop.

* * *

When I got home I headed straight to the shower and though it was barely 4 in the afternoon, I put myself to bed.

I couldn't fall asleep, though, no matter how long I laid there tossing all about, failing to get comfortable. I hated to think about it, especially since I couldn't really do anything to help it at the moment, but I knew exactly what the problem was: I missed strong caramel-colored arms that wrapped around my body and warmed me inside and out. I missed full, pouty lips that caressed my own, that kissed my skin all over and melted all my senses together and threatened to take my breath away. I missed a strong broad chest that held a steady beating heart and lulled me to sleep. I was missed that heartbeat so desperately. That beat, so strong, so deep. It was gone, but I could still hear it's echo in the silence.

For all my talk at lunch today, I knew that I had a long, long way to go in getting over Magnus. Truth be told, I suspected that I would never get over him completely.

The funny part was that the thing that has been keeping me up at night was that I was pretty sure Magnus wouldn't be able to get over me completely either. If his display at Luigi's was any indication, at least. It hurt me to no end, for some reason, picturing him a hundred years from now, looking back at my memory. Regrets were the reason Magnus did not like to think about his past and I knew that I was destined to be another regret in a long list of them. It really tore at me. If I couldn't give him forever, I would at least have liked to have given him memories to look back on lovingly.

* * *

 **Starting with the next chapter there is going to be way more malec-y malec interactions. So yea! We can all look forward to that. I hope to update again within 2 days.**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	3. Chapter 3

**I don't own TMI.**

 **A/N at the bottom**

* * *

I woke up Sunday afternoon to the sound of someone moving around in my apartment. I was mildly concerned but only because I lived alone. I called for Chairman Meow, but he didn't come running to me like he usually did. I stretched and got out of bed to find my little companion. Unfortunately, I found Pablo, but the Chairman was with him.

"I see you've lowered yourself to breaking and entering." I told him, folding my arms across my chest.

"I didn't want to drag you away from your company." Pablo wiggled his eyebrows and jerked his head towards the bedroom. "So I let myself in."

I smiled sweetly at my friend. "How very considerate of you." I said. "Its too bad that there was never any company in there."

He looked surprised. "No lay last night?"

I shook my head, frowning.

"Not even that cute little red-head?"

My frown deepened to an outright glare. I held a hand up to him. "Oh, don't even mention that bastard. He already had a date."

"Total bummer, bro."

"Yeah." I paused to give Pablo a proper disgusted scowl. "It's too bad you didn't get the chance to see his date. You might have recognized him. He's a shadowhunter."

Pablo just looked blank.

"Come on, have a guess. He's got dark, dark hair, beautiful blue eyes…super sexy…perfect…" I hated to admit this, but I was close to tears thinking about Alexander and his date again.

"Wait! Alec was with that guy?" The idiot had finally put two and two together. "Small world. That must be why you left so early. You talked to him didn't you?"

"Yeah… Didn't go so well."

"Magnus…"

"Alright Pablo. I appreciate you coming over, making terrible assumptions and finding out that your super wonderful plan backfired, but I'm going back to bed." I said, as I looked pointedly at the door.

"Magnus. Look, I apologize. I shouldn't have left-"

"It's okay. I don't blame you for any thing. I just want to be alone right now. I'll call you later."

Pablo looked worried so I tried to give him a smile, but I'm sure I only managed to look constipated. He smiled sadly at me and shook his head a bit, but kindly left me alone so that I could wallow in self-pity and misery peacefully.

And that I did, although, I'm proud to say, I showered and put on some clothing other than pjs or loungewear. I even put a bit of glitter in my hair. Doing that on my own volition gave me something of a boost. I played with the Chairman and he responded by being the cutest kitty on earth, doing the cutest kitty things (like usual). I didn't take any clients, though, because screw them. Wasn't in the mood. I was trying to play at being content today and dealing annoying clients was not going to get me there.

That went well until about 5pm. Out of nowhere I received a fire message. I plucked the paper out of the air recognizing the New York Institute's stationary. I hurried to read the message.

Magnus Bane

Council Representative for the Children of Lilith

Your services are requested at the New York Institute in Manhattan

Please make yourself available as soon as possible

Maryse Lightwood

I didn't believe I had any choice other than to hightail it to the Institute so I took a taxi out and found myself sitting alone in the library waiting for Maryse to return. She claimed that there were other people coming to our meeting. So there I sat, trying pretend that this room wasn't effecting me. Trying to pretend that this was just any ordinary meeting being held in just any ordinary library.

This room was, in fact, very dear to me. This was were Alexander and I shared our first taste of intimacy. I'm talking about the kind of intimacy that involved more than just our (epic) makeout sessions.

It had been an odd Saturday night by my standards. You see, I hadn't thrown a party that night and although I had been invited to a few, none seemed worthy of my illustrious presence. I tried to get Alexander to come over for an (epic) makeout session or two, but he was tied up with hunting with his siblings. His parents and Max had been in Idris on Clave business, so Alec had been in charge. Of course he took everything very seriously and made them patrol late into the night, even after they'd responded to all of the reported demon activity. After that, he said that Jace and Izzy were begging him to out with them. So I figured I was on my own for the night and resorted to watching TV and pigging out on Chinese food.

I was very shocked when Alec had sent me a text telling me to come to the Institute quickly. I tried to get more information out of him, but he wouldn't respond except to tell me that no one was hurt but to hurry up. When I got there all of the lights were off and the door was slightly ajar but, Alec wasn't there to greet me.

He had texted me again.

 _Come find me._

So I search for him trying his room first but no one was there. I wandered around a bit starting to grow uneasy, until Alec texted again.

 _Come on, slowpoke._

A few fruitless minutes later.

 _Try my favorite room_.

I knew that had to be the library so I headed there. The lights were out there too but a fire was roaring. Facing the fire was Alexander, sitting on a oversized couch. He stood and faced me, grinning, as I entered the room. He was shirtless. I sucked in my breath and promptly forgot how to continue breathing.

He looked so stunning, standing there. The light of the fire dancing across his creamy skin. His black runes standing out in sharp contrast.

"Are you just gonna stare?" He asked me.

"Darling, I can't help it when you look so gorgeous right now." I said, walking quickly to embrace him.

When he kissed me, it was with more urgency then I had ever felt from him. He was being quite aggressive, too. I was used to initiating almost all of our kissing, but Alexander lead the way that night. How we ended up rolling around on the plush rug and ridding ourselves of everything but Alec's boxers and my leather pants, I don't exactly remember. I wasn't willing to question it, though.

He helped me on to the couch, pushing me so that I was leaning back against the armrest, and started kissing a path down my bare chest to my waist. I was in heaven. As he kissed and nibbled around my hips, his hands went up to my shoulder blades. They slid slowly over my skin, down my back, to cup and grip my ass. I couldn't even think properly. The thoughts were previously in my head stuttered and stumbled over each other. My lovely angel was making his way lower again. His hands, his beautiful, sexy hands, slid to my hips, gripping them tightly as he mouthed my cock through my leather pants. He was rolling his head sinfully all around. I didn't want to scare him, but I really couldn't help myself as my hips moved forward begging for more.

"Alexander…" I moaned. There was something I needed to ask him, but for the life of my I couldn't remember what.

"Magnus?" He asked me, lifting his head and moving his hands up my sides. "I wanna try something. C-Can I s-…" He had trailed off shyly at that point.

"Baby, you can do anything you want." I half-moaned. I was ready to give that man the world so long as he continued being so naughty. My head was thrown back. I lifted it to see his face. He looked so adorably nervous. "Just say it, sweetie." I stroked his cheek.

He whispered quickly. "I wanna suck your dick."

I was not fully hard until I heard that. Oh, my angel. So sweet and so surprisingly dirty at the same time. "If you are sure you want to and you are ready then I'm certainly willing." I said slyly, winking at him.

Alec took a deep, steadying breath and pulled my already unbuckled pants down to my knees. I never wore underwear with leather pants so that wasn't in our way. He was looking at my magnificent erection a little bit shyly, but I was happy to see that he was very, very turned on. He licked his lips and looked up me and said, "Stop me if I do something wrong," and then his tongue was on my throbbing member, tentatively tasting me. He moved to wrap his soft lips around the head and sucked half of my length into his mouth.

I placed my hands on his and moved them to my hips. "Hold me here." I grunted. "So I don't move."

I watched him as his head began to move gently up and down. I don't know what spurred him on, maybe it was the helpless moaning that escaped my mouth, or my fingers knotting in his hair, or my hips that were trying to thrust upward against his restraining hands, but his bobbing on my dick became more and more energetic. Then I noticed that he was moaning right along with me. I was on the very edge.

"Ooooh Alexander, don't stop, my angel. I'm so close…" I groaned.

Alec grabbed the base of my cock in one hand and removed his mouth for a second to run the very tip of his tongue around my tip, and then over the slit. He descended again, sucking all the way to meet his hand, which was making slow, shallow strokes. I noticed that the bottom half of him was moving and I looked down. He had pulled his own cock out from his shorts. I saw it for the first time and my mouth watered. It was thick and wet with his pre cum. He was stroking himself while he was simultaneously stoking and sucking me. That was enough for me. I shot off into his mouth, moaning his name again and again-

"What are you doing here?" A painfully familiar voice asked, abruptly halting my reminiscing.

There I was sitting on that very same couch, nursing a half-boner when Alexander, Maryse, and Luke Garroway strolled in.

"Alexander." Maryse said sternly. "I requested that he come to our meeting. You will handle yourself with the proper decorum."

Alexander closed his eyes and took a breath. He nodded, opening his eyes again.

Maryse turned and walked to a large desk on the other side of the library, taking a seat behind it. Luke gave me a small, but warm smile before turning and following Alec over to the desk.

There were four chairs in front of the desk. Luke sat down first in the rightmost seat. Alexander hesitated for a moment before sitting next to Luke. I remained behind, on the couch, staring dumbly off into space. What business could Luke have here? Unless it had something to do with Clary. But then I'm sure Jocelyn would be here, too.

"Bane!" Maryse said sharply. "Would you care to join us?"

"Right." I stood up and thankfully my legs and feet decided to carry me over to the desk where I took the seat on the very left.

Maryse dove right in, addressing me first. "Are you aware of the recent illegal activities of the New York vampire clan?"

I shook my head vacantly.

Her eyes narrowed. "I don't know what exactly you have been up to, and I don't believe I need the details. I do know, however, that you have been shirking the responsibilities that go along with being a representative of the Clave. I have been silent as there hasn't really been a need to address it and I wished to allow you a certain amount of time to deal with, um, sensitive issues." Her eyes darted over to Alexander for a brief moment. "Recent events of the vampires and ongoing concerns with the status of the fair folk have made yours and Mr. Garroway's participation necessary."

Luke spoke up. "I'm prepared to help in any way I can. I will return to my role as head of the werewolves until we find Maia."

"What happened to Maia?" I asked. Yeah, I probably did need to pay more attention to what was going on around me.

Luke spoke. "Maia and Bat went missing two days ago. We believe that the vampires and the fair folk are working together and are behind this somehow."

"That's were you three come in. Alexander and Luke have been working together for the past month as liaisons for the representatives of the downworld." My head shot up to look at Alec. He looked away.

"Now Luke is acting a representative for the time being, as well, but we need to know that we have the support of the warlocks as well." Maryse eyed me closely. "Can I trust you to be a part of this, Magnus? Do we have your support?"

There was something about the way she asked made me look at Maryse more closely. She looked tired and vulnerable. I had never seen that woman look vulnerable in her life. I looked at Luke since I didn't dare look at Alexander again. He looked worried but determined. "I like Maia. I guess I'm in. I don't really have a choice though, right? This is part of my job, yes?"

"You could be replaced, Bane, but honestly the Clave sees it in our favor to have you on our side." Maryse replied. "If that is all, this meeting is over. I trust Alexander and Luke will fill you in on the specifics. The three of you will be working very closely on this in tandem." She paused and looked from my face to her son's. "If there is any reason why the two of you can't work together effectively please tell me now."

I just shook my head. I didn't want to give up my position in the Clave. I guess Alexander felt the same way because he told his mother that he could work with me and Maryse got the hell out of there. I turned to Luke. "Well, what do we do now?"

Alexander looked at me with his pretty blue eyes. "I guess we should head over to my place."

* * *

 **A/N I guess that's the end of that chapter?**

 **Thanks for the follows and the favorite and the two reviews. They all made me so happy.**

 **To the first guest: I'm glad you like it so far.**

 **To the second guest: I'm glad you find it interesting. Yeah David is a bitch, right? Alexander doesn't deserve that shit. You will find out some more about that night though.**

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 **Thanks for reading!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Here ya go! a/n at the bottom.**

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Luke, Magnus and I agreed to meet at 7:30 that night so that each person had some time to eat and do whatever we needed to do to get ready. I went straight home to eat leftover takeout and make sure my place was presentable before the others showed up. I left it up to Luke to give Magnus my address as I couldn't bring myself to look at him in that particular setting anymore.

I remembered sharing a very special night with Magnus in that library, a very steamy night. To this day I can't go in there without thinking about Magnus coming completely undone at my hands (and mouth), moaning and gasping, sometimes whispering, sometimes hoarsely screaming my name. But that felt so long ago and so far away from where we were now. Now I was expected to work closely with him in order to keep my new position in the Clave.

It was a position I felt very lucky to have. A little more than a month ago I had approached my parents with my plans to move out of the Institute. I was still planning on patrolling with the others and doing any other duties that fell onto me. But that was the problem, though. There were no duties coming to me, other than the patrolling. By all rights I should have been taking a more active roll at the Institute because of my age and my experience with the Mortal and Dark wars. At first I thought that because I had been moping around helplessly with a broken heart that my parents thought I wasn't in any condition to take on more responsibility. I was only half right. My parents were concerned about how I was acting, but they were embarrassed by it. They didn't think that a shadowhunter should be that devastated by a warlock. They were happy to be able to finally say that I wasn't associated with him anymore, but they thought that the way I was carrying myself was ridiculous and not worthy of someone with the blood of angels running their veins.

Feeling a bit spiteful, I went over their heads and spoke with the Consul, Jia Penhallow. It turned out to be a good thing that I did. Members of the Clave were starting to question my lack of involvement in the rebuilding that was taking place, in Idris specifically, and in our policies and our dealings with the rest of the world. Things were not perfect and they weren't going to become so any time soon, but the Clave was trying to become more open to those who were different than themselves. I didn't believe the faeries were impressed, as the Clave dealt them a pretty steep punishment for allying themselves with Sebastian Morgenstern in the Dark war, but the werewolves and some warlocks were benefiting from the beginnings of the new peace in the shadow world.

We couldn't be sure about the vampires, though. The Clave, or any of the Institutes had not been able to discern the vampires' position in any official capacity. That was were I, and others at other Institutes, came in. Jia thought that my level of compassion would be perfect for the new liaison branch of the conclave of New York. Said position had me working with the downworlder representatives as a middleman between them and the Clave to help foster communication and to solve any conflict that might arise. So far I had only been working with Luke, who had been helping since I started the position, and Maia.

A knock at the door pulled me out of my thoughts. It was Luke, looking grim.

"I finally managed speak with Sal, the leader of the vampire clan in Haiti. He couldn't tell me much out of fear of retribution, it seems, but it looks like our fears have been confirmed. The vampires are planning something with the faeries."

"I just wonder why." I said. "Did he give you any indication as to why the vampires would side with the fae? Or what they are planning?"

Luke shook his head and sighed. "No and no. I got the impression that Sal didn't know much, although you can bet he knew at least a bit more than what he told me."

"I take it you trust him?"

"Yes I do. He is an old friend." Luke responded causing my eyebrows to shoot up. He gave a wry smile. "Alright, maybe the term 'friend' is too strong, but I do trust him."

It didn't seem like he was going to further explain so I steered the conversation to our more immediate problem. "So, you're thinking this is tied to Maia and Bat, right?"

"I am almost sure that Maia's kidnapping has everything to do with the vamps and faeries. They're making some sort of statement. Bat probably got taken just because he was with Maia, defending her." Luke said.

"Yeah. If that's the case then they will probably be making more statements. You should probably think about taking extra precautions, now that you are a rep again. Magnus, too." I added, absently.

"I wonder where he is." Luke said, checking his watch. "It's after 8:30. He should have been here an hour ago."

As if on cue, there was a knock at the door.

I hurried over to answer it. I was shocked at what was on the other side. Looking very agitated and a quite ruffled was Magnus holding Chairman Meow (even the Chairman looked to be in a state of disorder) and wheeling a large, stuffed to the brim, suitcase.

I stood there looking at the two of them like they were the ghosts of Valentine and Sebastian coming for an evening visit. Of course Magnus had the nerve to be snide. "As much as I love admiring what you have done with your lovely doorway, I'd really appreciate being shown inside."

I literally jumped aside allowing Magnus to pass. He sighed dramatically, pulling his luggage in and sitting the Chairman down. The cute little guy sniffed the air and looked around. He pranced right over to me and began to paw up my pant leg. I guess he'd missed me as much as I missed him. I leaned down and stroked him a few times around his ears and cheeks. "Hey there buddy. How ya been?" I asked him, forgetting anyone else was there for the moment.

"Magnus, what's going on?" Luke asked him. "Why do you look as if you are prepared to move in?"

"I don't know about that." Magnus said, he gave me a fleeting glance as I looked up from the Chairman. "I do need to figure out someplace to go for a few nights, though."

"What happened?" Luke asked sharply.

"I was at home, preparing to come here when someone knocked on my door. I thought it was just a client so I opened the door from the other room. I started to get suspicious when no one said anything or made a sound." He explained, making himself right at home and flopping down on a stuffed armchair. "Damn cowards were too afraid to try to fight me outright so they had to resort to using some sort of smoke bomb."

"A smoke bomb?" I asked.

Magnus looked at me thoughtfully. "Yes, but it was a very ancient sort of faerie-made smoke. Deadly stuff. I recognized it immediately. The Chairman was right next to me thankfully. I snapped my bag together and portalled out of there."

"Shouldn't it have taken you a while to make a portal?" Luke asked.

"The time it takes to prepare a portal depends on the amount of people that need transported and also the distance that needs to be travelled. I was able to prepare my particular portal quickly as I set it to take me only two blocks away. After that we travelled by cab."

Luke glanced between Magnus and I and seemed to make a decision. "Magnus, you are welcome to stay at my place while we figure out if you place is safe enough to go back."

Magnus was about to say something but I cut him off. "I don't think that would be a good idea. You both are reps and right now it looks like that's who is being targeted. It'd be safer if the two of you did not live together."

"I'm sure I can find somewhere to stay for a while." Magnus said, glaring at me.

I nodded, standing up, ignoring the way he was looking at me. "Okay. I have to call in a report to the Clave. With your permission, Magnus, a team will be sent to your apartment tonight for investigation. Luke, you are free to leave and we can touch base tomorrow afternoon. Please, both of you, use extra precaution."

Luke said his goodbyes and left. I left Magnus in the living room to contact the Clave. When I got done Magnus was looking at me strangely.

"You're different, now." He said.

I remained silent, waiting for him to elaborate.

He stood up and casually strode over to me with his hands on his hips. When we were face to face, just about six inches apart, he said, "The blush is gone. As is the stutter." He cocked his head to the side and narrowed his eyes. "It's nice to see you in a position of…" He leaned in slightly. "Control."

"Oh?" I cleared my throat and took a couple steps back, not really sure how I wanted to answer that. "Did you figure out living arrangements?" I asked instead.

"Yes. I'm moving in here."

"W-What? What do you mean?"

He clapped his hands together and smiled cockily. "There's the blush and stutter I've missed so much!"

My face grew hotter but I remained speechless.

"Look." He said, serious for the moment. "I can't get ahold of anyone that I trust and would be able to put me up for a while so I guess your it. Its your job, right?" He asked, his eyes turning hard.

"I guess, technically." I sighed and added quietly. "I want you to be safe and have a place to stay, even when it isn't 'my job'"

Magnus just blinked at me, without comment.

"I'm sure you will be able to move back home by tomorrow anyway." I said, more to myself than anything.

I shook my head to clear it. I had to make it through this night with my sanity intact. Somehow. "I turned the spare bedroom into my office, but I'm sure you are more than capable of turning the living room into a cozy space fit to sleep in, right? Just make yourself at home. Please."

"If you can just point me in the direction of your bathroom, I would just like a nice long soak." Magnus said.

"Okay well, you'll have to use my bathroom. The one out here only has a shower." I pointed to the door of my bedroom. "Just through there. Take your time, I still have a lot of work to finish up anyway." I managed to smile weakly in his direction before making a break for my office.

And I actually did have plenty to do. I had to type up the report that I had phoned in earlier. I had a couple of informants that I needed to make contact with before the night was over. I had meetings that needed to be set up for in the morning. I had to make a schedule for the next day and for the week.

This job kept me busy already, but I knew that it was going to be very intense for a while. I welcomed it wholeheartedly. I loved being able to take an active role in the Clave and to still be able to spend most of my evenings demon hunting.

After I had spent close to two hours at my desk, I realized that I was very tired. Anything else would have to wait for the morning. I stood up and stretched and turned the light out. When I left the room I saw that Magnus had snapped in a large bed with fancy drawn curtains made of red lace all around it. I figured he was asleep so I went quietly to my room.

I had an early appointment for breakfast with an informant set for the next day so I decided to take a quick shower tonight before retiring to bed. I unbuttoned my pants pulling them down and stepping out of them and my boxers. I opened the bathroom door as I pulled my shirt up over my head. I walked into the bathroom, my eyelids half-closed as I rolled my head and shoulders, trying to work out the kinks built up from the long day. I froze when I felt the distinct sensation of someone watching me.

"Well, what a nice treat. Did you want to join me?" Magnus was still taking a bath!

"Oh! I-I... Raziel! I'm sorry, I thought you were sleeping…" I know I sounded lame.

Magnus just sat there calmly, looking like a bronze god luxuriating in my tub. He laughed lightly. "I really don't mind." His eyes were slowly traveling up and down my naked body. His full lips parted.

I couldn't move. One reason was because I was so embarrassed. Another was because I was taking in the view in front of me. Magnus looked so good. And I could see a lot. I mean A LOT. The bubbles that were surely in his bath earlier were basically nonexistent now. I could see all of his flawless caramel skin. His chest, with his brown nipples that I wanted to put my mouth all over. His lightly defined abs that I wanted to run my hands over and reacquaint myself with. His dick. Oh angel, his massive, monster of a cock was there lying underneath the water looking huge even in its state of non-arousal. Me on the other hand. I was starting to get hard. I was starting to remember some of the activities we could engage in while naked.

I knew Magnus was comfortable in situations that were totally awkward to normal people, but then he decided to crank the awkward dial all the way up by standing up. He smirked at me.

"Can you hand me a towel?"

"I-I…" Water was streaming down Magnus' body. Down his chest. Past his hips. Over his thighs. His skin just seemed to glow. I was entranced.

Magnus reached a long arm out toward me. "A towel?" He repeated a bit louder.

I snapped out of my stupor suddenly. "S-Sorry. Here." I snatched a towel down from the shelf beside me and half tossed it at Magnus, finally attempting to avert my eyes and cover myself with a robe.

Magnus walked passed me looking smug, as his eyes travelled down my body once more. "Tub's all yours, big boy."

I let out a huge breath once I was sure he was all the way out and in the living room. I unplugged the tub to let it drain and turned out the light. I pulled off the robe and got into bed. As bad as I needed relief I couldn't bring myself to give in to my physical needs. I didn't want to confuse and further complicate my already complicated situation. I wasn't confused about my feelings, though. I mean, I knew that I was still physically attracted to Magnus. I was still attracted in pretty much all the same ways, in fact. I still loved him.

The thing that was different now was that I didn't think that the love that we shared had ever been enough. Hadn't we proved that back in that subway tunnel months ago? If we could not make it past one big argument then didn't that mean that we were not meant to be together?

The thing that I was confused about, though, was how Magnus felt. I knew the stuff in the bathroom was just him messing with me and trying to see how flustered he could get me. I just didn't know why he seemed like he wanted to discuss things with me now. The last time I had tried to plead with him, he didn't want to even hear it. Now it was like he was considering trying to work things out. How ironic was it that now I was the one who didn't think it was worth it to try anymore.

As I laid there trying to will myself off to sleep, I hoped that resolutions were on their way. A quick resolution to the problem with the vampires and faeries. Wishful thinking, I know, but I was willing to do anything in my power to avoid another all-out war so quickly after the last two.

A quick resolution for Magnus and I was also welcome. I was convinced that we could not be together in a way that would last long-term. I was hoping, though, that our time working together now could help us at least become friends.

The next day I woke up early to meet with my informant. We had arranged to meet at a diner in Manhattan. I waited for an hour before David called me sounding rather distraught and out of breath.

"Alec! I can't meet with you. I probably wont be able to contact you for a while… Shit…"

He had been almost whispering, like he was afraid of being overheard.

"David? Why can't you meet me? Are you in trouble?" I asked.

I heard a loud noise, like he had dropped the phone. I heard him yell 'shit' again then it went completely silent. I tried dialing him back but it just rang endlessly each time.

* * *

I was pretty close to the Institute so I decided that it would be a good time to talk to my mother. She actually wasn't the person I answered to directly in my new position, but as the head of the Institute, and my mother and elder, she was obviously someone who I always had to answer to eventually. I'd been putting off talking to her about certain things for a while. Hell, she had deluded herself into thinking that my moving and my new job were only temporary. I allowed her to believe that to keep the peace. It was finally time to grow up and come clean to her about my plans for the future.

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 **A/N**

 **This chapter was hard to write. It just didn't flow like the previous ones so I had to rewrite it a bunch of times. Anyway, I hoped you liked it.**

 **To the guests who reviewed: Thank you! I am glad that you anticipate the updates!**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	5. Chapter 5

**Thanks for the new favorites and follows. They make me happy! Short A/N at the bottom.**

 **I don't own TMI.**

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I found a note from Alec hanging on the exterior of my lacy curtains when I arose from my slumber this morning.

Magnus-

I forgot to ask you last night, but I need you to secure warlocks for our side. If there are any warlocks you trust, please contact them.

I left a spare key on the counter in the kitchen so that you can come and go as you please.

I will be home around noon. Please make yourself at home.

-Alec

It was funny how having Alexander expecting me to do something really helped me to get my ass in gear like nothing else had in months. I had already woken up early. Okay, a little bit early; it was 8:30 and I had already changed out of my pjs, transformed the living back to its original state, done my morning facial cleansing and minimal makeup (just some black eyeliner, mascara, and clear lip gloss). I threw on some forest green skinny jeans and a tight hot pink v-neck that was lightly sprinkled with green glitter. I left my hair down, but ran a little glitter gel through that gave it a bit of structure.

I sat down at the dining room table, snapped my fingers to get some coffee and a cinnamon roll from a local shop and pulled my cell phone out. I knew that I could definitely call Catarina and Pablo to ask if they would stand with the Clave if needed. I trusted them. There were no other warlocks I could contact by phone with this type of question. It would be best to conduct this business in person in order to assess the situation correctly. I needed to see the male or female's reaction up close and in person.

Things were different for warlocks than it was for all of the other classes of downworlders. We didn't hang out in packs or clans or have a place full of our kind to come home to every night. Warlocks are loners. It was not uncommon for two or three or more to be very close friends and to even stick very close to each other for a while when it was convenient or necessary for survival, but more often than not warlocks stayed out of each other's business and lives.

It had worked for me and my friends rather well for all of our lives. I suspected that it stemmed at least partially from the nature of our conception and our upbringings. Not too many warlocks were raised fully by their birth parents. Not too many warlocks ever met (or would want to meet) their demonic parent. The other parent was usually long gone once they figured out what they had spawned. Point is, social norms that other downworlders and even shadowhunters and mundanes dealt with were lost on us.

As I suspected, the call to Catarina was simple and quick. She agreed to do what she could to help the Clave and got off the phone promising to get together with me soon to catch up and to get more details into the current situation. That girl was always busy so I knew it would probably be a while before I would actually be seeing her.

As I was thinking about that, my phone rang.

"What the hell happened to your place?" It was Pablo.

"I was just about to call you. Why didn't you answer when I called last night?"

"I was busy making a portal for one of your regular customers. Some impatient young warlock- Elijah or something- he's pissed at you."

"Oh yeah, that asshole. He simple refuses to learn how to perform the simplest of spells. If I actually gave a damn I'd be worried about his long-term well being."

Pablo chuckled but it was short-lived. "Seriously though, I just left your apartment. Its fucked up."

"That's why I called you last night." I said with some attitude. "They did it with faerie smoke." I heard Pablo gasp. "I was looking for a place to crash."

"Oh shit! Fucking faerie smoke! Someone was trying to kill you, dude! Your whole building is corroding away."

"Shit! I guess I wont be going back there for a while."

"Where are you right now?"

"Um somewhere safe. I've put protections up here and everything. Look, I'm actually working right now. Don't gasp. I'm fulfilling my duties as the warlock representative to the Clave." I said in my most regal voice.

I went on to explain to Pablo about needing to secure more warlocks for the Clave. He was in, of course. I asked him about the warlocks he used to be close to. Pablo decided to take a recruiting mission to Mexico. He had had quite a few friends that he trusted back there that he used to hang with about a century ago.

He would be leaving in a day or two and I told him I could take on a couple of his more important clients while he was away as long it didn't interfere with whatever I was doing at the time. As of very recently I actually had things to do.

"I still don't get how they even got close to you like that. That smoke is only effective indoors. You did have your wards up, right?" Pablo asked me.

"Um, I may have let them in with magic…without checking to see who it was first." I answered sheepishly, waiting for him to reprimand me.

He sighed. "I probably don't have to tell you how incredibly stupid that was because that was incredibly stupid. Don't do that again, Magnus. I can't belie-"

"Alright, alright. Geez, Pablo, I get it. I'll call you later." I hung up without waiting to hear him yell at me some more.

By the time I got finished talking to Pablo it was almost 1pm. I guessed Alec was running late. I had really run out of things that I was willing to do that day, so I decided to quit until the boss gave me further instructions.

I was feeling restless, though, and watching TV was making it worse and the Chairman was busy ignoring me in favor of getting used to his new surroundings. I didn't want to leave since Alec would probably be back soon and I was curious as to what he had found out today, if anything.

I resorted to doing something that I haven't done in several months. I put a soundproofing spell on Alec's apartment so as not to disturb his neighbors. I snapped my fingers and his furniture jumped to the perimeter of the room. I turned on a music app of my phone and did a simple spell that amplified the music.

I was never one to do many traditional fitness activities like weight lifting or working out. When I was in the mood to sweat I chose more fun and exciting pastimes such as engaging in passionate sex or (not nearly as fun) a dancing session.

I didn't have anybody that I could have passionate sex with (well I did, but he was resisting me right now. I mean, I really was hoping he would have joined me in the tub last night. Oh well.) so I just had to settle for the dancing. I wanted to keep myself well rehearsed in case I got back into the party scene again.

I spent the first 30 minutes just feeling the music and moving around to it just loosening up. The songs were mid-tempo to upper-tempo. I starting dancing with more focus, doing moves that I already knew and trying out some new ones that I made up as I went. I worked up a sweat and pulled off my shirt, slinging it over my shoulder to use as a towel as a slower song came on. I was about to skip ahead until I realized it was a song that I was very familiar with. Sexy Love by Ne-Yo. I immediately thought about Alexander and wished that I had been able to dance to this song with him back when we were together. I just wished that I had danced with him more. Actually, thinking about it, there was so many things that we never got a chance to do. Things that we could have been doing all this time if I had not have been an impulsive dickhead and broken up with him.

I was thinking about all of this as I moved to the song. I danced slowly, bending my knees and twirling my hips and pelvis seductively and stepping back and forth, side to side, pretending Alexander was there with me. I could just see him in my mind's eye. I put my hands out to where his hips would be, as if my hands were resting there.

If he were there he would have definitely had a nice little body and facial blush going on. He would have been trying so hard to look down at our feet so I would have been having to almost permanently have my fingers underneath his chin, lifting his head up so that ours eyes could meet. When he looked into my eyes I would never look away. I would tell him how much I needed those gorgeous blue eyes and after some serious coaxing he would finally hold my gaze. The longer we danced, the more his confidence would grow. I'd hold him closer so that I could feel his heartbeat. Our breathing would become in synch and heavier as our temperatures rose from our exertion and arousal. After staring into each other's eyes for what would feel like forever we would finally kiss as we were still grinding against each other sensually.

The song ended but I was too much into my own fantasy to let it end there. And the lyrics were so perfect for how I felt about Alexander that I snapped my fingers and made it replay so that I could pretend dance with him longer. I was so far gone that I started humming and singing along as I danced. I threw my head back to the beat and used my shirt to wipe the sweat off of my face and chest. What happened next sent a major jolt of electricity straight through my veins.

Alexander had come up behind me silently and he placed his hands lightly on my hips. I froze. He had to have been an apparition. I must have been pretending so well that the Alexander from my imagination came to life and was doing sexy and seductive things to me under his own autonomy.

He groaned lowly and ground his hips forward gently against my ass.

"Alexander…?" I had to see if he was real. I turned the volume of the music down some.

"You can't keep doing this to me. Are you trying to drive me crazy?" He asked, his voice sounding strained.

"I'm not trying to." I said, like the tool that I was. It was the wrong thing to say because he dropped his hands and jumped back a good few feet away from me. He turned away looking upset.

"I'm very sorry." He adopted that formal sounding voice that be had been using with me since we started talking again. "I shouldn't have lost control like that. It wont happen again."

Well fuck. I should have kept my mouth shut, maybe tried for a kiss or something. Of course I'd ruined it. I had to try to fix this.

"I'm not sorry, Alexander. I didn't plan that but why can't we just go with how we're feeling?" I took a few steps towards him and was surprised that he turned back toward me.

He sighed. "I want nothing more than to give in to my base needs right now." He ran a hand through his hair. "I want you." He said forcefully, his voice deep. "I know you know that."

I took another step toward him. I could touch him now, easily, if I just barely reached out. He was watching me. I could just tell that he wanted me to touch him. That he wasn't going to make the first move. I was conflicted though. What if I touched him and he came to his senses and slapped my hands away. What if he kicked me out and refused to ever see me again. I was being dramatic but I just didn't want to mess this up and this was a very delicate situation.

What I did know was that I couldn't just let the moment pass and do nothing. I had never been that person. The one who just let opportunities like this slip by. I slowly reached for his arms.

He kind of clinched up a bit, but he let me place my hands on him. I let my hands slip down to his and pulled him closer after I saw that he still wasn't resisting. "Hey, we don't have to do anything too crazy, but there's nothing wrong with a little bit of touching like this, is there." I asked him softly.

"I don't think I can spend too much time with you without touching you, but I do feel like this is wrong." He looked so conflicted.

"It doesn't feel wrong."

Alec sighed. "Ok, it feels right. That's what makes it so wrong."

I decided to go for it. "Alexander, dance with me?" I turned the music back up and took a step back. I looked steadily into his eyes and held a hand out. He could decide if he wanted to take it or not.

Alec looked from my eyes to my hand a couple times before grabbing my hand in a swift motion. It was as if he had to do it fast or he wouldn't have done it at all.

As good as my fantasizing about my dancing with Alexander was, it couldn't compare to the real thing. Especially since I could feel pure energy radiating between our bodies. The physical desire was glaringly palpable. Alec and I were clinging to each other as if these were our last moments on earth. Whenever our eyes connected everything, every emotion, just magnified. Surprisingly, I was the one who kept breaking eye contact. It was almost too intense and I found myself almost wanting to push away just so I could catch my breath.

Alexander's hands were slowly caressing the bare skin of my upper body. I tried to hold back my moans, but I wasn't doing a very good job of it. I'd been wanting this boy to touch me for months and now that he was finally doing it, well, I knew what heaven felt like.

Alec took a deep breath and licked and then parted his lips. My eyes widened as he slowly leaned up to me. Suddenly we were kissing. Slow and deep. I still can't do anything to stop the moans that are being produced in back of my throat. This time, though, he's moaning right along with me. It all sounded perfected sinful.

Our kiss was slowly becoming erratic. Our hands roamed all over each other becoming rougher and not as gentle as it was moments ago. Our teeth bumped together and our frenzied breaths mingled as our lower bodies crashed and ground together to our own frantic beat. We only broke contact to catch our breaths for a half second at a time before we were back at it again. I found myself vaguely worried that one of us might pass out or hyperventilate.

Alec paused to pull up his shirt. Why didn't I think of that? No matter, I ran my hands down his sides to help him. Now I ran my hands over his insanely muscled chest and abs. My lips soon followed as I kissed trails down Alec's stomach. My mind ran over all of the things that I could do to him and I was pretty sure that he was going to let me. Just as I was about to dip down lower I saw the front door open.

I have never been a big fan Jace's, which is a huge understatement. At that moment, though, I was willing to risk death at the hands of the Clave as punishment for murdering him slowly.

As soon as Alexander noticed that he was in the living room, he flew away from me like I had the plague or something.

"Well, what do we have here? I thought you weren't even on speaking terms with the warlock." Jace asked in his usual cocky manner.

"Jace don't." Alec said, fighting to get his shirt on as quickly as possible.

"Don't what? What was all that bullshit you were saying the other day at lunch? Just bullshit, I guess." Jace shook his head and looked angry. The bastard.

Alec shook his head. "It wasn't bullshit. I-I made a mistake. Just please leave, Jace."

Jace was getting ready to respond with something witty, I was so sure, but Alec cut him off.

"Please, Jace. Get Izzy and meet me at Taki's. I have a lot of things to tell you guys, ok. Just give me a bit." He nodded his head my way. Jace stared him down for a couple of moments, gave one nod, and then turned and left out the front door.

Alec turned back to me and I already knew that I wasn't going to like what he was about to say.

"Magnus, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have lead you on like that. We can't do… _that_ again."

I shook my head. I couldn't accept that.

"Alec, I love you. I miss you so much. I hurt you and I wouldn't listen to you for so long. I'm so sorry for that." At this point I had no shame in begging. Not when I knew exactly what I wanted. "I want you back, Alexander. Nothing is right without you."

Alec wasn't taking my gut spilling the way I would hope. He shook his head, too. "I'm sorry, Magnus. I can't do this. We just don't fit together anymore."

What the hell did that mean? He didn't even want to make an attempt to fix the relationship. Did I mean nothing to him? That couldn't be true because if it was he wouldn't look like it was so hard for him to turn me down. And he wouldn't have kissed me like that.

"That guy. Was he your boyfriend?" Realization dawned on me. "You replaced me already." Tears were threatening to fall.

"If you mean David- the redhead- that's not my boyfriend. He's not even-" He cut off. "Its complicated. I don't want to talk to you about that right now. I have dated a few guys, but nothing serious."

"But you said earlier that you wanted me. I don't get it. What is the problem?"

"Us! The problem is us." Alexander squeezed his eyes shut like he couldn't bear seeing me anymore. "And the fact that you don't seem to think that you have any issues."

"Alec, I don't want to fight, but I'm not the one who tried to take away the other's mortality. I don't blame you for that anymore, though."

"And according to you, there are no other problems that ever stood in our way."

"Well, no. That was the main one."

Alec's eyes narrowed angrily. "Tell me about your past."

I hesitated. Why was he even bringing that up? "That's not fair, Alec. Why does that even matter? You know everything that you need to know about me. End of story."

"Right." He said shortly. "That's exactly what I'm talking about. I have to go. We need to talk later about Clave business. We should probably keep our interactions work related from now on."

With that he turned and left, slamming the door.

I was left wondering what the hell just happened and how, exactly, did I get this so wrong.

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 **So Jace is a cockblocking sumbitch, right? Don't worry he'll make up for it...**

 **I should be able to update in the next two days. That's the goal anyway.**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	6. Chapter 6

**blackcurlsofacynic: Thank you for your review! I'm so glad you liked the last chapter. I really wanted to show how I thought Alec would be after he got the chance to reflect and grow a bit with all the things he learned from his first heartbreak and the confidence he gains due to his budding career. And yes, Alec can barely control himself around Magnus' sexy ass. Heehee.**

 **This chapter is very dialogue heavy and not very Malecy. I'm sorry.**

 **I don't own TMI**

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I took a taxi to Taki's. Jace and Izzy show up about 5 minutes after I grabbed a booth and ordered some coffee for me and iced tea for them.

Jace sat down looking annoyed, grabbing his drink like he owned the place. Izzy looked annoyed too, but she seemed to be more mad at Jace for some reason.

"Ok. Somebody better start talking, like now. Why did I need to be dragged away. I was training with Simon." Oh, so that's why she was irritated. Figures.

Jace looked at Izzy with his face scrunched up in disdain. "Can you forget about the former bloodsucker for just a moment. You're the one who keeps insisting that Alec has been hiding things from us." Jace turned his angry golden gaze to me. "Go ahead, _Alexander_ , spill. Now."

I took a moment to look between my sister and brother. I should have known that I couldn't keep things from them for long. Actually, I did know it. It had just been so much easier to hide things now that I didn't live with them and I was too busy to see them as much as I used to. Before, I was never able to keep anything from them.

"I have not been entirely… forthcoming with you guys lately, I guess." I started.

"Really? How's that for an understatement?" Jace deadpanned.

"Jace! Let him talk." Izzy looked at me hopefully. "Maybe he can't tell us everything because the Clave swore him to secrecy or something."

Jace let out a humorless laugh and looked at Izzy incredulously.

I had to start talking before this really went south. I didn't want them to argue because of me.

"I'm not sworn to secrecy. I just didn't want you guys to have to get involved if I could help it. There's some rogue vampires and faeries out there kidnapping and even killing people. We just got out of a crazy war, I just wanted you guys to be able to be relatively normal before you have to go saving the Clave's ass again."

I finish my little speech with a sigh. Jace wasn't having it, though.

"Not good enough, sweet cheeks. I want details. You cannot be going around kicking vampire and faerie ass and seriously think its ok to just leave me out of it."

I smiled at him. He would have a problem with being left out of the action.

"I'm sure you know about Maia and Bat getting kidnapped, right? Well there have been more attempts and each time its someone that is connected to us."

Izzy's head shot up. "What do you mean 'connected to us'? Who?"

"Well, its just a hunch, but it seems like that. There another of Luke's pack got attacked this morning. Someone attempted to either kidnap or kill Magnus last night and then there was something weird that happened with David this earlier today."

"Magnus got attacked?!" Izzy shouted.

"Who is David?" Jace asked.

"Yeah David." I sighed, not wanting to go into it but knowing that I had to. "He is the guy I went to that club with last Saturday. And before you ask, yes he's a mundane, but there something weird going on with him. I'm basically dating him so that I can figure out what he's up to."

"What the hell?" Jace's eyes cut to me sharply. "You're actually ok with that? What exactly could a mundane have to do with vampires and faeries, anyway?"

"Luke and I think he is being used by the vampires, being compelled or something. He's always hanging out around the neighborhood of the Hotel Dumont. I don't know, I feel kind of guilty because I think he actually likes me. Ugh. I have a feeling, though, that he is supposed to be using me for something that the vampires want. Some information, I think. But he probably could have already done that already."

Before he had tried to take advantage of me that night I thought that David might have been a nice guy, outside being my enemy and working with people who didn't have the best interests of the Clave and it's allies at heart.

"I may have slipped up around him and got drunk that night…After I saw Magnus." I finished, feeling very sheepish and more than a little bit stupid.

"Alec! He could have done anything to you. Why didn't you let us come with you?" Izzy almost looked like she was ready to cry and she never cried. Add guilt to the ever-growing list of uncomfortable feelings that were gnawing at me today.

"I know, I know." I looked from Izzy to Jace. "And I want your help. I am officially asking you guys to work with me on this. You will have to get the ok from mom, though. I don't think I will be able to keep it from her. She's watching me like a hawk."

"Yeah, she's still pissed at you for moving out. And for talking to Jia without her consent." Jace grinned his approval at me.

"Well, that's just too bad for her, isn't it? When is she going back to Idris? I feel like she's never going to leave."

Izzy giggled. "I think she's lingering around to stay close to you, Alec, so she can spy on you. She totally ignores us. As usual." She said, rolling her eyes.

Izzy's eyes lit up as if she were remembering something. "So…Magnus… I see you tried to gloss over that. What's the current story about him?"

"He got attacked with illegal faerie smoke, which we learned later could have killed him. He recognized it right away and was able to get away. The end."

Jace narrowed his eyes at me. "And why was he at your apartment just now?"

"What? The end, my ass. I thought you were over him, Alec." Izzy said furiously.

"I have to work with him now. He's is the rep for warlocks, you know."

"Back to the bullshitting, I see." Jace stared into my soul like he was trying to see all of the secrets that I was hiding there. He didn't break contact for more than a minute.

I was beyond uncomfortable because my eyes were starting to water. I needed to blink but since Jace, the robot, wasn't blinking I had to fight it. I finally had to look down at the table and relieve my poor dried out eyeballs.

"Jace. What you saw was a mistake. I shouldn't have let him get to me like that."

"What happened? What did that filthy bastard do to you?" Izzy spit out like the words were venom. She had been the loudest in her negative opinions of Magnus thus far. I suspected it was because she had actually liked him a lot- even rooted for our relationship- and considered his breaking up with me to be some sort of personal attack against herself. If that makes any sense.

"I don't know if name calling is going to work out so well, Izzy. You will have to at least try to get along with him. If you help me you that means working with him too." I paused and waited for her to stop looking so mean. It never happened. If anything, she looked meaner after she processed the information. I continued anyway.

"So, he's living with me until he can figure out a safe place to stay. He wont be going back to his apartment for a while. Nobody really knows how to fix the damage since no one's been dumb enough to mess with that stuff in ages."

"But what happened, Alec. I know there's more." She continued her onslaught of furry. Jace just kinda sat there smirking, probably happy that Izzy was yelling at me.

"We made out." I yelled back. I mind went back to Magnus's hands on me and his body pressed up against mine. I had to swallow the little smile that was threatening to show up on my face.

Izzy saw it anyway. "Alec, kick him out. I don't care where he goes. He's a big boy, hell he's an old man. He'll figure out somewhere to live. I will not allow you to fall for that jerk again. He's no good for you, Alec. He's a fucking inconsiderate snake and you can do so much better than him."

Surprisingly, it was Jace who stopped her rant. "Ok, Izzy, I think he gets your point. Tone it down a bit."

"Shut up, Jace! You know what I'm saying is true." Jace didn't look at her or respond, which made Izzy more pissed. She stood up, abruptly. "Screw this shit. I'm going to go see Simon."

With that, she stormed out, still grumbling about how stupid boys were, or something like that.

Jace looked at me and actually laughed.

At first I didn't know what to do, but eventually I joined him and laughed a bit, as well.

"You love him still." Jace had sobered up and was staring me down again. I hated his staring contests. He always won.

"Yes." I said softly.

"He loves you still."

"How would you know?"

"Let's just say that I have visited him a couple times and all he was ever doing was moping around, looking like hell. I mean, he answered the door wearing clothes that looked suspiciously like the ugly shit for clothing that you wear and he wasn't even wearing glitter. Not wearing _glitter_." Jace whispered the last sentence and looked scandalized at the very thought.

I felt my eyes grow bigger as I sat frozen. "You know what's scary? Sometimes you sort of remind me of him." I said slowly, vaguely repulsed. "Really, I mean, you're both conceited bordering on narcissism. You're both very obsessive about your looks… I think I might need therapy."

Jace rolled his eyes. "Probably the only reason you could get over my perfect self." He grinned impishly at me, showing off his canines. "You went and found second best, which, I'd like to point out, is no small feat."

I cover my ears with my hands like a child. "Oh my fucking angel. Jace- shut up."

I could seriously picture Magnus saying something exactly like that about Jace. It was more than a little disturbing. (And yes I know what you are thinking. I did previously harbor a weird and complicated crush on Jace not too long ago. It wasn't even a real crush, though, so it didn't really count, right? I would really appreciate it if you'd just keep quiet about it, thank you very much.)

"Ok. I'll stop." Jace turned serious again. "If you stop lying and tell me the truth."

I put my hands back on the table. "The truth about what. I've been pouring out my heart here already. Guess that's not good enough."

"Hey, I'm your parabatai. And in case you don't remember, we are some of the only people who can say that we've been to hell and back together and not be exaggerating. I know when you're not being honest with me. And I know when you're not being honest with yourself. So stop trying to derail the conversation. You want him back, don't you."

I didn't answer. I didn't know what to say to him. I was honestly confused, too. From the way he reacted to what he saw in my apartment, I thought he hated the idea of Magnus and I just as much as Izzy did. Now, I'd be damned if Jace wasn't trying to encourage me to give him another chance.

"I'm confused." I finally confessed to Jace. "Do you want me to stay away from him or not?"

"You should be happy. I know you haven't been happy for a while." Jace sighed. "How I feel- or anybody else, for that matter- shouldn't matter. Don't think about anyone else, for once. You gotta go with how you feel, Alec."

Jace was sounding eerily similar to what Magnus was saying earlier.

"Jace, you know I'm not just resisting him because of my pride or anything like that. He still, to this day, doesn't think he should tell me anything about his past. He thinks I'm just being naïve by wanting to be let into that part of his life. As long as he feels that way, I can't be with him, no matter how much I want to be. No matter how much I love him."

Jace sighed. He looked contemplative, but he didn't say anymore on the matter. He didn't have to, though. We had discussed this before, ad nauseam. He'd been the only person that I had discussed my real reason for staying away from Magnus. I knew that he would understand. Jace honored and respected the truthfulness just as much as I did. Maybe even more.

I changed the subject. "I'm having a full meeting on Friday at 5pm with Luke, Magnus and possibly some other warlocks that he trusts. I believe Luke is having Jocelyn join us. Please tell Izzy. Oh and Clary and Simon, too." Jace looked pleased that I'd invited Clary.

I continued. "Actually, I want you guys to come early, if possible, so we can go over everything before people we don't know get involved. Its time to get team good back together and figure this out."

Jace smiled at that and agreed. We went our separate ways, but not before planning to meet up later to hunt.

I didn't have anything else to do in the city so I picked up a pizza and some chicken alfredo and went back home. I was expecting Magnus to be gone, but he was sitting on the couch when I got there, stroking the Chairman's fur and just staring off into space.

I sat the food down and cleared my throat to get him to look up at me. "There's some food here, if you'd like some."

His eyes darted to me briefly and then over to the food on the table. He gave a smile that didn't reach his eyes and mumbled something, shaking his head.

"Ok, well, If you don't mind, I need to tell you some things."

Magnus nodded his head and finally looked at me without looking away. He looked like a kid that had just been told that Christmas was cancelled. I could barely keep eye contact with him.

"We will have a meeting here on Friday at 5. Will that be enough time for you to round up some warlocks that you trust? I didn't get a chance to ask you earlier."

"Should be." He answered curtly. "I will be sure to get them here for you."

"I want to tell you about David. You asked earlier and I promise its related to work." I said and relayed the information I suspected about David that I shared with my siblings earlier.

Magnus took the information with a blank face. He looked at me with a funny expression that I couldn't place. "I found a place to stay. I'm sure that will relieve some stress for you."

My pulse sped up and my stomach felt queasy for some reason. "Where?" I asked him.

"Well tonight I will probably be at a friend's, but after that I will move into a hotel."

"No." I said loudly, startling him. "Your staying here. I can't have you get attacked again." I ran my hands through my hair, looking at him pleadingly. "Please. Just stay here so I don't have to guess if you are safe."

His eyes softened as he looked at me. "If you insist. I just thought that it would be better if we put some distance between us."

"Well, I obviously can't keep you here if you want to leave. It doesn't have to be awkward, though. Its up to you but I think there is enough space in here for us to coexist. I'll probably be gone a lot for the next few days. And when I am here, I'm usually in my office or bedroom."

Magnus nodded.

"If you need anything let me know. I will be in the office for the rest of the evening and then I'm gonna go hunt with Jace. I can leave you a note in the morning again of things I need you to do. If I even need anything. Is that ok?"

He only nodded again.

I grabbed some pizza and pasta and headed to my office to make lists and phone calls and fill out reports. I did see Magnus get up and linger around the pizza box before I closed my door. He still looked sad, but I was glad that he was going to stay. I needed him close to me. At least until we fixed the our faerie/vampire problem.

I felt guilty for feeling that way. I didn't want to send him mixed signals, although I'm very sure that I was just that. I just hoped that I wasn't hurting him too much. I hoped I wasn't hurting myself too much, too. Honestly, I didn't know what I was doing. I just knew that we both had a long way to go in getting over each other and moving on. Living together was surly just prolonging things, but we were both adults and we would just have to deal with it.

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 **Thanks for reading! Another chapter in a couple days!**


	7. Chapter 7

**blackcurlsofacynic: Thanks for reviewing again! Team good will be in the next chapter!**

 **AKA Annabeth: Thanks for the review! I'm glad you like the story so far!**

 **Short A/N at the bottom.**

 **I don't own TMI**

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Alec and I had been really trying to exist together in his apartment with as little interaction as possible. It had been working, too. I chalked that up to the fact that he was always gone. He even asked me to make him a portal on Wednesday, which was yesterday. He needed to go to Idris for some emergency meeting with other Clave members who worked as liaisons at other institutes. He didn't really give me many details, but he seemed kind of panicky. I just made his portal and tried to stay out of his way until I ensured that he had made it through safely.

Now I was waiting for Pablo to call me back. He had just gotten back from Mexico the previous night and he had brought a few friends back with him. I really just wanted to talk to him about Alec, though. What we were going to actually do was get together so that I could meet the other warlocks. Oh the joys of meeting new people when all I wanted to do was curl in on myself and slowly disappear. But I didn't want to disappoint the boss so I needed to make sure these newcomers were trustworthy.

If I was being honest with myself, and I usually am, I had to say that the things that happened on Monday left me majorly confused. I had been ecstatic when Alec had taken my hand and danced with me that afternoon. Actually, the thing that made me happiest was him coming up behind me sneakily like he did. That was a nice boost to the old ego. I wondered how long he had been watching me. Thinking about him standing there, getting all hot and bothered just by seeing me move my body turned me on so much that I was almost temped to pull it out and jerk myself off right then. Hmm. Maybe I'd just do that later. Like when I was alone lying in my big sexy bed, thinking about Alexander lying in his bed with only a door separating us. He probably wasn't even coming back home tonight. Great. Now I would be doubly alone tonight.

It had gotten so hot between us on Monday that I couldn't stop running the whole scene through my head. And that kiss was explosive. I was not a fool, though. I didn't think one dance and super-hot make out session was enough to get us back together. Even if that super-hot make out session would have led to a super-hot love making session (and it might have if Jace hadn't have had such impeccable timing). Alec was obviously still hung up on an old issue.

It was an issue that I couldn't even wrap my head around. Alexander was always wanting me to tell him things about my past. I guess I could understand it from his standpoint, but he never seemed to get that I just wasn't comfortable talking about it.

If I talked about the past I would be forced to relive it. I wasn't good with that. My past was not exactly filled with things that I would want to remember, much less brag about. I already lived it once and I wasn't keen on rehashing it.

On top of that, there was still the issue of his mortality and my immortality that existed between us. I knew Alexander wanted me to try to find a way to give him immortality without having to turn him into a vampire or something. That or he wanted me to find a way to take away my immortality and age like a human along with him.

I knew that immortality was not the kind of life that Alec would be comfortable living. He was a shadowhunter for God's sake. Shadowhunters just don't give up their privileged places they were sure to get in heaven. Being a half-demon, I don't know too much about Angels and heaven and its rules, but I have to believe that freely giving up one's mortality would be a major sin that the Angels or whoever was in charge may not forgive. Especially when it involved a shadowhunter.

Alec being immortal would mean that he would watch the people that he loved grow old and die. This was one of the main reasons why I stopped forming attachments with new people. Most of the people I cared for were set to live for a very long time, just like me. Of course, being with Alec changed all that.

A life of immortality is a punishment, not a reward, no matter what books or movies would have you believe. To live forever means to never have a purpose, to wander earth and never atone for any of the many sins that you rack up over the centuries. If you believe in those sorts of teachings.

Don't get me wrong immortals die all of the time. But death is something that most immortals have a tricky relationships with. To an immortal death is the promise of a hellish afterlife. There is most certainly no warlocks, or vampires for that matter, hanging out with Raziel and his kinfolk up in a cushy, tricked out heaven.

If I were to take away my immortality it would be a risk. I'd never heard of anyone who had managed it successfully. In every single instance- of which there are very, very few- the immortal had only managed to kill themselves on the spot. I suppose that Alec and I could had just lived our lives and then pulled a Romeo and Juliet of sorts when he was about to keel over. I don't know though, it all just sounded very melodramatic. I would have had to follow him around like a creepy stalker for the rest of his life since a shadowhunter's risk of death automatically heightened just by them waking up and taking a step out of their front door.

So anyway, I thought I had made everything better, at least in our immediate issue, by deciding to leave but Alec wouldn't let me. He had been very adamant in wanting me to stay to make sure that I was safe. I understood that because I felt the same way about him. I know he's not just messing with my emotions. Alexander is much too sweet and straightforward for that. On the flip side I also knew that he was not asking me to stay as a way for us to get back together.

As depressed with the whole situation as I was, I was pretty proud of myself. I was actually getting back in the swing of things as far as seeing clients and doing spells and making potions for them goes. I took more precautions now and I wasn't meeting with anyone unknown clients, but I wasn't about to be intimidated. I didn't make it to be the High Warlock of Brooklyn by being a coward.

So I found myself out and about, meeting with clients in their homes or in restaurants or coffee shops. I had just finished making a contract with a werewolf for a particularly complicated potion that she wanted me to make for her once per month. I was sitting alone at the table contemplating ordering something to eat when Pablo finally called.

"Hey MagMag. Where ya at?" Pablo asked, sounding very hyper.

"I'm back in Brooklyn, actually. Just got done with a client. Should I just come to your place to meet your friends?"

"Nope. We're going to Luigi's. Its early so we can all have dinner and drinks and hang out casually, you know?"

"Alright, I guess…"

"Oh- my bad. Will it be awkward for you to go back there?" Pablo asked.

"No, no. I'll be fine. What time do you want to meet?"

* * *

I went shopping for new clothes. I told Pablo that I wouldn't be affected by going back to Luigi's but I couldn't help feeling a bit of dread at the memory of Alec hugging up on that looser in that same club. I spoiled myself with some new, ridiculously expensive clothes.

By 6pm I was dressed rather magnificently. I strutted into Luigi's and commenced searching for Pablo and his little group.

I noticed quite a few heads turning as I walked towards the back of the club. Maybe it was my skin tight leather pants that stopped just above my ankles. They were a deep royal purple with diamond studs all over the thighs. They matched my diamond studded purple leather pumps. On top I wore a simple yet tight mint green muscle shirt. Over that was a very fitted white blazer that I wore with the sleeves casually shoved up to right below my elbows.

Or maybe people were staring because of my make up. I had went all out for the first time in months. Purple lips and green eyelids might sound over the top to some people but it looked simply smashing on me.

"There's the man of the hour!" Pablo exclaimed! He was taking in my outfit with raised eyebrows and a bright smile.

I cocked one eyebrow at him. "If you keep gawking at me like that, I'll be forced to make a move."

"Calm down there, tiger." Pablo laughed as he slapped my on the back, by way of a greeting, I guess, or maybe to punish me for flirting with him all the time. "Meet my buddies."

He turned to the table that he had been sitting at. There were four warlocks -three male and one female- sitting at a large round table. They all looked similar to Pablo with lovely brown eyes and light chocolate skin. They were all glamoured, but I had no trouble seeing through it once I focused on it.

The only one who looked much different once the glamour was gone was the female. She had pink skin that shimmered like she had applied a thin layer of very fine silver glitter to her skin. Since I am a glitter expert, I could tell that the shimmer was her natural skin, and not something applied on top of it.

As I sat eating dinner, talking to and getting to know the warlocks I found myself admiring Alondra's pretty pink skin. I thought I was being covert, but later after we had finished eating and were playing a round of pool Pablo pulled me to the side.

"Alondra thinks you're cute."

"Of course she does. Have you seen me?" I replied with the perfect amount of cockiness.

"Oh, so you don't care, huh? I saw you looking at her all night. Why don't you talk to her?"

"No thanks. She wouldn't be interested in a guy who's still hung up on his ex."

"You don't have to tell her that. And you seem to be doing much better."

"I'm coping with it better, I think. I'm not actually feeling any better about the situation, though."

Pablo sighed and it sounded slightly exasperated. I noticed that he sounded like that a lot when he talked to me, lately. "Fine. Just think about talking to her. She's sweet. And very sassy. One of my oldest friends."

I nodded. "Maybe." I said, going over to pick up a pool stick.

I played a game of pool with the male warlocks and learned their names. Pablo had introduced them earlier but I wasn't really paying attention then. The youngest of them was Angelo. I thought that was a great name for a half demon and I told him so.

"That's why I love the name so much. Imagine my poor mama's horror when her little angel turned out to actually be a devil." He said with an infectious laugh. I found myself laughing along with him although the subject matter was something that I would have never brought up so casually.

The other two warlocks were twins named Miguel and Hector. The two were just as friendly and funny as Angelo. I could definitely see them being close friends with and getting along well with Pablo. They were just like him, only much nicer.

After easily beating the guys at pool Alondra slinked over to me and asked me to dance. I politely declined.

She didn't give up. "Listen, I talked to Pablo. I know about your ex. I'm not going to be in this country for long. We could just have some fun and then you can go back to pining for him."

I had to admit, she had a point. And I liked her moxie. "Hmm… I don't want to further complicate anything."

She handed me a piece of paper. "Take my number. I'm going to be alone tonight. You can join me if you change your mind. We can sit and talk or we can do something more fun. More strenuous, if you'd like." Alondra's eyes sparkled as she gave me a sly smile.

I took the paper and nodded mutely. I think she stunned me into silence momentarily.

It was only 8:45 but I found Pablo and told him I was going to call it a night. I reminded them all of the meeting at Alec's set for the next day.

My head was swimming with a jumble of thoughts as I rode a taxi back to Alec's place. Alondra was pretty sexy and I'd never met a friend of Pablo's that wasn't a decent person. I was just a little intimidated since she obviously wanted to have some sexy grownup time with me.

The way that I had acted around her and how I was reacting now was bothering me. Magnus freaking Bane was not shy and hesitant when it came to advances made by men or women. I was starting to see what Pablo meant when he said I had changed.

What would be the big deal if I went to hang out with Alondra? I didn't have to go to bed with her. We could just talk, as she said. And its not like Alexander had not been seeing people. Lilith knew what he was doing on his dates. He certainly didn't act timid like he used to when we first met.

I paid and stepped out of the cab. As I walked up to Alec's door I pulled out the scrap of paper with Alondra's number on it. I decided to meet with her. Somewhere public, though, and to just talk. If I had a good time and got to know her better then so be it.

I opened the door and saw Jace sleeping on the couch. He jumped a mile in the air when he heard me come in.

"Its about time." He snapped at me, rubbing an eye.

"Were you waiting on me, Goldie?" I asked, amused. I spread my arms out wide. "Well, here I am."

"I need to talk to you."

"Never would have guessed." I rolled my eyes. "Did you run out of people to talk to or something?"

I was very happy to see that he was annoyed with me.

"No. I just need to talk to you about Alec."

That put me on alert. "Is he hurt? Fuck! Why didn't anyone call me?" I was half-way to the door, ready to go save Alec.

"Cool your jets there, Sparkly. I wouldn't be asleep on the couch if my brother was somewhere hurt."

"Oh. Well, why else would you be here to talk about Alexander."

"He's going to be in Idris until tomorrow so I figured I could talk to you without him knowing. I'd appreciate if you keep this between us, as well."

I scowled at his golden face. "I can't promise that because I don't even know what this is."

"You're being stupid when it comes to Alec." Jace said, bluntly.

"What the hell do you know about it."

"I know plenty. I know that you are acting like a child. Just tell him what he wants to know. You do that and he will literally come running back to you."

I shook my head at him and gave him a look of disgust. "I'm sure its not quite that simple. Alexander thinks that he wants to know that stuff, but some things are better left locked away and in the dark."

"You're not very good at relationships, are you?" Jace wrinkled his nose at me.

I felt my eyes narrow at him. For a second time that week I contemplated ways to torture and/or kill him.

"It probably doesn't seem like it, but I'm not here to piss you off." Jace continued, once I didn't answer him. "Alec is my brother, my best friend, and my parabatai. I wasn't always there for him. He's always there for everybody, even when he had you hogging up all his time."

Jace ran two frustrated hands through his long hair. "I have to try to help him with this, if I can. He's putting up a strong front. Its not just a front, actually. I'm proud of the way he's been handling his new responsibilities."

Jace's cheeks turned slightly pink as he said that. He face was a mixture pride and sheepishness. He probably wasn't used to handing out compliments to anyone besides himself. Or possibly Clary. (Maybe.)

"So what are you saying, exactly? Alec wants me back? I already know that. He just refuses to accept me the way I am. He's being so naïve."

"You stupid fucking warlock." Jace made a move like he wanted to grab a seraph blade and use it on me. His expression quickly changed to one of loathing. "I'm starting to understand why Izzy hates you."

"Oh no, not Izzy. What am going to do now that Izzy hates me." I said, mockingly.

"I don't know why I came over here."

"Me either."

"I know you're hurting. I know you want him back. You need him, don't you?"

I turn away from Jace and don't say anything because he already knew the answer.

"I'll leave you alone, but you should know that if there is anyone being naïve and acting immature about your situation, its not Alec. Its you."

I turned back to Jace, but couldn't find anything to say. He stared me down, challenging me to deny what he just said.

There were plenty of responses and denials going through my head but I couldn't bring myself to say anything.

Jace pushed passed me, his shoulder hitting mine. On purpose, I was sure. I could swear that he mumbled 'pathetic' as he passed me and walked out the door.

I was starting to get a headache. Jace's little visit sapped all of my energy or something. I walked into the living room and started peeling my too tight clothing off. I took a short shower and got ready for bed. I snapped my usual bed into the room and climbed in.

As I relaxed in under the covers I thought of what Jace said. Was it possible that he was right? I mean, as old as I was, it was true that I wasn't the best at relationships. Before I met Alec I was jumping from person to person without ever taking the time to form anything that resembled a loving and lasting commitment.

Even so, though, I wasn't ready to take advice from someone as shallow and idiotic as Jace. Ok maybe he wasn't either of those things, but that boy took the gold medal for being annoying and pissing me off. And what the hell did he know about relationships? He was damn lucky to have stumbled upon Clary. Before her, he had not been in anything committed himself. Nope. I would follow my own advice and not take advice from that one.

For what felt like the hundredth time that day, I was utterly confused.

* * *

 **So it looks like Jace was doing some more cockblocking. That's ok though cuz he's blocking Alondra this time. Which is great. She's a nice girl, but we all know she was gonna try to get Magnus out of his tight little pants and into hers. We simply cannot have that.**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	8. Chapter 8

**blacksurlsofacynic: Thanks for the review. I think Magnus will be figuring things out here soon...**

 **Guest: Thanks for the review. Yeah Jace is my hero! And, by all means, slap Magnus. Just don't mess up his pretty face.**

 **I don't own TMI**

* * *

I stumbled out of the portal in the wee small hours of the morning on Friday. Actually, I wasn't sure of the exact time. My phone was dead and I had been so desperate to get away from Idris and the incessantly endless and useless meetings that I rudely woke up a warlock that I had met earlier and demanded a portal be made.

After I spent a moment gathering my bearings I walked laboriously down the street to my apartment. I was very lucky that no one was around to see me appearing out of nowhere. Why hadn't that stupid warlock just portaled me inside of my apartment?. Hmm. What had I even said to the guy? I guess I was too tired to remember.

Apparently I was too tired to do much of anything that required even a minimal amount of brain power. It took me a few tries to unlock the door once I finally got to it, and that was after a three minute self-inflicted pat down for my keys that were hanging out in my jacket pocket, exactly where they were supposed to be. I finally got in there, though.

All I wanted to do was go to bed. I had been running back and forth to so many meetings since Wednesday that I hadn't slept longer than two hours at a time at any one point. I couldn't recall ever being this drained of energy before. I needed to eat something first, though. Having not eaten anything in more than 12 hours was probably another reason for the lack of energy, after all.

I crept into the kitchen, trying hard to be quiet, but every step I took made me more and more tired. As a result, I became more and more clumsy. The more clumsy I got, the more noise I made. I was tripping over chair legs and my own feet so much that I paused twice to check to see that my rune for equilibrium was still in place.

Somehow, I eventually found myself standing over the stove, just looking at it. After about a minute of that, I shuffled over to the cabinets and pulled out some pans to cook with. I ended up knocking a bunch of them out and onto the floor. Luckily, nothing landed on my bare feet.

I stood still, and listened for a few moments, hoping that I hadn't woken up Magnus. He did _not_ need to see me like this.

I didn't hear anyone rushing into the kitchen so I went to the fridge to find something to fry up. I was standing there with the door open and my head and shoulders leaning up against the freezer, starting to doze off, when I heard Magnus say my name sharply. I crouched down a little too fast and immediately started looking through and grabbing things out of the fridge, pretending to be a normal, healthy person.

"What the hell? What are you even doing?"

Ohhh. Even when he yelled at me, his voice sounded like silk. I got up, sat the things I was holding down, and turned to face him. He was wearing a black silk robe and probably nothing under it.

"I'm hungry. Are you hungry?" I felt delirious. Even the thoughts running through my head felt weird.

Magnus was looking at me all squinty eyed. He looked tired, but also curious.

"Its 5:30 and you look like hell. Did you just get in?"

"Yes, mother." I snorted at my own stupid joke. What the hell was wrong with me?

Magnus' beautiful eyebrows raised up a bit. "Are you drunk, Alexander?"

Uh oh. His voice was all silky again and he was using my full name and it was doing things to me. Nice things that made me feel uncomfortable and squirmy. Which is probably why I was uncomfortably squirming under his steadfast gaze.

"I'm not drunk." I tried to sound indignant but only managed to sound weak. I cleared my throat in order to manage a more manly tone. "I'm exhausted. I need food. I could make us some food."

"Let me do it. You're going to destroy your kitchen." Magnus looked around pointedly to the mess I had already made, but his voice was softer.

"I got it." I huffed. I bent to pick up one of the pans from the floor.

Magnus snapped his fingers and two plates of eggs, sausages, and French toast appeared on the kitchen table, along with two paper cups of coffee.

"Sit down and eat. I want you to take a shower after you're done and then go to bed." He said, sternly, to me. "If you want, I can wake you before the meeting later."

Magnus grabbed his plate and coffee and made a move to leave the kitchen.

"Join me?" I asked him. My mouth was full from having already been on my second bite of breakfast.

He hesitated for about a second before coming back to the little table and sitting down.

We ate in silence, with me sneaking glances at him when he wasn't paying attention.

If I had to guess, I would say that it was my very tired, near exhausted state that morning that rendered my ability to resist Magnus almost nonexistent. I just wanted to go over and sit in his lap and feed him the rest of the food on his plate straight from my fingers. And maybe straddle him and caress his yummy face. And explore exactly what was under that robe. And stick my tongue down his throat. And run my hands all over his-

"Are you aware that you are staring at me?" Magnus asked me with a little frown, interrupting my train of thought. "Very intensely, too."

"I-I. Sorry." I finally finished with my food and avoided his gaze by throwing back the rest of my coffee.

"I'm not exactly complaining. I just want to know what's up with you today. I thought we weren't supposed to talk to each other. Why are we breakfasting and gazing into each other's eyes?" Magnus shrugged and sighed. "I'm just very perplexed, I guess?"

"Yeah, sorry. Thanks for the food, by the way. I guess I feel a little better now." I said. And I did feel a bit saner after eating. "I just haven't had anything to eat in a while and I've been in nearly nonstop meetings for the past two days."

"Ok, I get it. You should go for your shower now. I'll clean up in here.

"Ok, thanks." I tried to resist the urge to go over and hug him. I ran out of the kitchen and into my bedroom before I did any other stupid things.

In the shower, I started to feel really tired again. I was having urges again. As crazy as it sounded- even to me- I really wanted to ask Magnus to come to bed with me. I knew I would sleep better if I could just cuddle up with him.

It had been complete torture to go to bed almost every night since Magnus had been here, knowing that he was in the other room, all alone. What would really be so wrong with the two of us sleeping in the same bed? Nothing, right?

On that note I finished my shower, slung a towel around my hips and walked out to the living room. I could see Magnus in the kitchen, finishing his cup of coffee or latte, or whatever. I slinked over to his nice bed with the sexy red curtains and pulled them apart.

One side of the bed was rumpled, obviously the side that Magnus had slept on. That's the side I climbed in on. I closed the curtains again and buried my head into his pillow. I just kind of rolled around a bit, trying to get his scent all over my body, still warm from the shower. Yes, this felt really nice.

I was just about to float away to sleepy land when I heard Magnus pull back the lacy curtains and start to climb in. He gave a little yelp. I guess he'd spotted my lying there.

"Alec! What are you doing in here and why are you naked?"

I shielded my eyes as the early rays of sunlight were beaming in and glancing off of Magnus' skin, giving him the illusion of a saintly glow. I giggled "But I'm wearing a towel." I said as I looked down at myself. "Well, I was at first."

"Alexander, you can't do this to me. I didn't think you were this cruel. I can't stay here like this."

"No! I'm not, I swear!" I shouted, desperately. "I just wanted to sleep with you."

Magnus' eyes widened. "I-I. You… What? I don't understand."

I reached my hand out to him. "Come here." I said, softly.

His wide eyes only got wider. His breathing became a little wild. "Are you sure? I don't know if this is a good idea."

I was so tired at this point and my eyes kept dipping low, but I had to explain this to him.

"I just want you to hold me. I want to touch you and fall asleep with you."

Magnus seemed to be conflicted and he hesitated for so long that I thought he was going to turn away from me.

"Ok." He said, his eyes still questioning, but he looked hopeful.

He removed the robe he was wearing so that he only had on a very tight, very small orange briefs. He climbed in next to me.

Before he even had the chance to settle himself properly, I attacked his lips. His proximity to me must have given me an energy burst. In no time at all he was kissing me back, pushing me on to my back to hover over me. I felt his hands as they softly slid all over my face, neck, chest, abs, and anywhere else he could reach.

I moan into his mouth and ran my hands over his arms, his back, and then up the back of his thighs and his clothed ass. He ground his hips down onto me. I could feel that we were both becoming hard.

I really wanted to flip us over so I could grind my cock down on to his and kiss him silly and dominate him just like he was doing to me, but I was much too tired for that. As it was, my mind was already starting to slip away every minute or so. I fought it, though. I didn't want to stop kissing this sexy man.

Especially when I could taste his sweet lips and tongue. I could hear his helpless moans. I could feel his body shiver wherever I touched him. Whenever I opened my eyes I saw his sexy caramel skin, his full, pouty lips, and those yummy green and gold slit eyes that had me hooked since day one.

And he looked like pure melted honey, his body was hot and dripping all over mine. So sweet and heavy. I was drowning in him and you couldn't pay me to try to escape.

I felt like an innocent maiden about to be corrupted. I felt like Eve in the garden of Eden, getting ready to pluck the forbidden fruit and sink my teeth in. One word played in my head over and over like a scratched record: Magnus, Magnus, Magnus.

I was moaning shamelessly, my breathing fast and erratic. I didn't have enough energy to reach the short distance to grip his body anymore, so my arms just laid there, sprawled and bent at the elbow, my hands and fingers splayed out by my head. And Magnus filled my sight, looking too good to true as he rubbed his sweet, sexy body over mine. As he sucked on my neck and nibbled my ear. As he dragged his fingers down my sides, torturously slow.

Eventually, though, Magnus must have notice how tired I was. He suddenly moved off of me. I parted my lips to protest, but he put a finger up to my lips, effectively shushing me.

"You need to sleep, darling." His voice sounded lustful and husky. " I'll stay with you, at least until you fall asleep."

I scooted over into his arms, snuggling up to him and it felt so right, there. I breathed a deep breath in and sighed it out slowly, resting my head on his chest and hearing his heartbeat. Home.

Before sleep took me, I tilted my head back and looked up into Magnus' eyes. "I love you." I said and promptly fell asleep.

* * *

I woke up feeling much, much better and much more like myself. I knew immediately that I had made a fool of myself in front of Magnus.

I groaned remembering my sleep-high induced attempt to seduce him. I wondered what was going through his head during all of that.

"Are you awake?" I heard his voice ask.

For a moment I thought he was still in the bed with me. Then I noticed the spot he had occupied earlier was empty.

"Uhh, yeah."

"Great. You should probably get some clothes on. Then would you please call your brother? He wont stop bothering me since you're not answering your phone."

"Oh yeah. My phone is dead."

"I charged it for you."

This whole time we were speaking through the curtains since neither of us opened them. I don't know if it was just on my end or not, but the awkwardness hung thickly in the air.

"I'll be in the kitchen…" Magnus was saying. "So you can get ready." I heard his light footsteps retreating from the living room.

I slowly got up from the ridiculously comfortable bed. I slipped one of the sheets around my body and went into my room to find something to wear. I came out a few minutes later and found Magnus leaning with his back against the counter in the kitchen.

"Um…so, about earlier… I was basically running on fumes and not in my right mind." I began.

"Let me guess. You want me to forget about every thing that you said to me? You want me to just carry on like you didn't kiss me. Again."

I felt my cheeks turning red, as I thought back to what happened a few hours ago. "I think we did more than just kiss."

Magnus looked up quickly. His eyes intense and questioning.

I sighed. "I don't want you to forget it. I was just trying to point out that I would have never had to courage to do that if not for being so out of it. But, I didn't say anything that I didn't mean. Or do anything that I didn't want to do."

Magnus shook his head looking confused. "What are you saying to me, Alexander?"

I took a deep breath. "I don't think I would say no to a physical relationship…"

Magnus shot straight up from the counter. "Are you proposing being fuck buddies with me?" The look on his face was pure disbelief. "Maybe you need to go back in there and get some more rest."

I felt my skin get hot so I knew I was blushing everywhere. "Never mind."

"You know as well as I do that you would never be satisfied with just having sex with no strings attached."

I just shrugged my shoulders. He was probably right, but I was in need of some type of relief. And I couldn't fathom having sex with anyone other than Magnus.

"Have you ever been in a purely physical relationship before, Alexander?" He asked me. It seemed to pain him to do so.

"No." I said so softly I wasn't sure he could hear me even though we were standing quite close to each other. I must have been inching closer to him since I came into the kitchen. "I have only ever been with you, Magnus. You know that"

He took a deep breath. His eyes were soft. "I didn't know if things had changed." He paused. "I haven't been with anyone since you, Alexander, but I don't think I can just have casual sex with you."

I take a step closer to him. "It doesn't have to be casual, then."

Magnus slid sideways along the counter and further away from me. "Alec, as stupid as I feel for saying this, I can't let you do it. You have been denying me all this time because I don't want to tell you things about my past. You might be ok with this in the beginning, but you will be curious again at some point. Will you not?"

I ran my hand through my hair, probably making it an even bigger mess than before. "Probably." I felt a sharp pressure around my eyes. I knew if I kept talking to him I would be in danger of crying.

Magnus suddenly grabbed my hand in his. "I know what it is to want someone so overwhelmingly and desperately. And to know that you can't have him. We are in the same boat, so to speak." He pulled me closer so that we were inches apart. "Maybe we can make a compromise."

I sucked in a quick breath. Was he finally ready to let me in? To tell me things about his past? Or was he just going to lead me on?

I took a good look at his face. He was looking at me with the look of resolve. I was just about to ask him to tell me what he was thinking when we were both startled by a pounding on the front door.

I looked at the clock above the stove and saw that it was half past 2. I turned to get the door that was still taking a beating by whoever was on the other side.

Magnus put a hand on my hip and gripped it tightly for a moment before letting go. "Let's continue this conversation later," He whispered directly in my ear.

I made to look into his eyes, but I couldn't get past his sexy lips. I wanted to kiss him so badly, but I just nodded mutely and finally went to the door.

"Fuck, man! What took you so damn long?" Jace barged right in after I opened the door.

Clary was with him, but she hesitated before entering. "He's was worried about you." She said apologetically. She finally stepped through the door after I waved her in. "Jace, calm down. Clearly, Alec is fine."

"He could have answered his phone then, Clary."

"Jace. Why don't you stop yapping and hear what he has to say?"

Although Clary and I had gotten off to a rough start in the beginning, I couldn't help but admire the girl. I don't know anyone who can handle Jace the way she does. And its good for him, too.

"Magnus told me you were trying to get in touch, I just got distracted once I woke up." I told him.

"Oh yeah? What distracted you." Jace looked between Magnus and I and a lazy smile began to spread across his face.

Magnus just starred back at him without any discernable expression. I, on the other hand, couldn't meet his eyes or answer without stuttering, making Jace laugh. Even Clary giggled a bit into her palm.

"It's not like that!" I practically shouted. I tried to sneak a look at Magnus. He caught my eyes and just smiled a little bit, raising his eyebrows.

Jace just shook his head. "Whatever. You two are weird."

I ignored his comment. I was sure he was already bored with the subject, anyway. "Are Izzy and Simon on their way over?"

"Yeah, Simon just texted to say they were 20 minutes away." Clary answered.

"Great. You all can help me set up for the meeting. I'll tell you all the stupid shit I learned from the Clave over the past couple of days.

* * *

Magnus ended up doing most of the set up by summoning a huge table and a lot of chairs to accommodate the 20 plus people expected at the meeting. Jace spent most of his time obsessively cleaning first the living room area where the meeting was going to take place, and second, the kitchen. I drew the line when I saw him trying to sneak into my bedroom with some bleach and a rag.

For some reason Izzy and Simon were late and showed up only a few minutes before all the rest of the guests did. Izzy looked pissed off, but when I tried to question her about it she blew me off.

"Screw you Alec. Its not like you care why I'm upset."

"Of course I care."

"I've been ignoring you and you haven't even noticed, have you?"

I guess she kind of had a point there. But only a very small point.

"I haven't even been in New York, Izzy. Are you still mad at me about Magnus?" I asked, trying to keep my patience in tact.

"Whatever, Alec." She said, walking away and sitting down away from everyone else.

I looked over to Simon, wondering if I should go talk to him. He was deep in conversation with Clary. The poor boy looked like he was barely holding himself together. Maybe he and Izzy were having a little spat. I looked back to Izzy to see that she was alternating between throwing daggers (figurative ones, thank the angel) at Simon and me.

Great. Another crisis for me to fix. It was going to have to wait until later, though. The room had began to fill.

 **I'm going to cut it off here folks. Next chapter will be the actual meeting and a bit of action.**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	9. Chapter 9

**I don't own TMI**

* * *

I sat down next to Pablo at the table that I'd summoned into Alec's living room. The room was full of people, but the meeting had yet to start.

"You're an idiot." Pablo said.

"Hello to you too, bestie."

"Don't try to get cute with me. You stood Alondra up. How long are you gonna be all lame and pathetic?'

"As long as I damn well please. I didn't mean to upset your friend, though."

Pablo laughed. "Not that you're not totally fetching, but she really wasn't too upset. Alondra has never had a problem finding company when she wanted it."

"Oh." I pursed my lips at him.

"Anyway, you might not have to worry about me for much longer." I said while trying to not smile too much. Coincidentally, I glanced over at Alec, who was moving over to stand at the head of the table while deep in a conversation with another shadowhunter.

Pablo followed my sightline over to Alec, who, luckily wasn't paying us any attention. "Ah. The shadowhunter. I just can't with you right now."

I rolled my eyes. "Come on, now. You know I hate it when you start talking like a teenage girl like that."

"I'll just give you the same advice that I gave you before, although I'm fairly certain that you don't listen to a damn thing I say. Even when I'm imparting my infinite wisdom that others would pay good money for the chance to hear even a snippet of." Pablo paused. He didn't seem like he was any hurry to finish his thought.

I heaved a sigh. I was used to his silly little ways. "Please, Pablo. I am but a filthy vagabond, wishing to feast upon your vast bounty of knowledge." I said dryly.

"Um… Just be careful, ok?"

What an asshole. "Such first-rate advice. I am forever indebted to you."

Pablo was about to say something else, but at that moment Alec (finally) cleared his throat and addressed the room.

"As most of you know, I'm Alec Lightwood. I lead the liaison branch of the conclave here in New York. I want to start by saying that everyone here is an ally. We will need to act as such- work together- to be able to figure out just what is going on and put a stop to it before it escalates even more.

Alec paused to take a sip from his water bottle.

"Unfortunately, the Clave will not help us much until we have more information and proof as to who is behind these kidnappings."

"Its not just as simple as kidnappings, boy." An agitated and oversized werewolf yelled. "One of my pack was killed."

"Right. The official word of the Clave is that the incident was most likely a result of infighting with your pack." Alec held up a hand as if to ward off any more outbursts from the guy.

"It shames me that my own people feel that way about one of our allies, without even the courtesy of giving your pack the benefit of the doubt."

He paused and scanned the faces at the table. The werewolf seemed to be satisfied enough with the comments, at least momentarily.

"Are there any more concerns anyone feels need to be addressed up front? If not, we will move on and I promise everyone will get the chance to voice your thoughts a bit later."

As I looked around, I could tell there were things on people's minds, but no one said anything. I guessed it had something to do with Alec's demeanor.

I had noticed that my previously shy little shadowhunter had changed, but it was never as pronounce as it was since the moment he started this meeting. He was poised and confident. He was eloquent and in command. Most importantly, though, he was compassionate. In the few sentences that he had uttered, he had shown that he was not a shadowhunter who just echoed the sentiments of the Clave. No, Alec was his own man and he believed that everyone in the room was on equal footing.

"Our enemies have started to attack institutes." Alec continued. "There was an attack to the New Jersey Institute on Wednesday. It was done rather clumsily, but one person did get hurt."

This led to an open discussion between Alec and four unfamiliar shadowhunters that I assumed were there when the attack went down.

It seemed that 10 shrouded figures appeared as the head of the Institute- a guy named Thomas Brandywell- was leaving. He immediately alerted the others and they soon joined the fight. The intention of the attackers was clear. They wanted to get inside of the Institute and release the same kind of faery smoke that they'd attacked my apartment with.

The person holding the smoke released it too early and only managed to somewhat harm Brandywell. He lost all feeling in both his arms and one of his legs. He was currently being treated by the Silent Brothers.

Alec also informed everyone that he had been in contact with someone who was most likely affiliated with our enemies.

"There is a young mundane man, by the name of David Mullingar, I have been meeting with. He has been… intriguing, for the lack of a better word." Alec paused as my insides recoiled at the mention of that red headed brat who was so obviously interested in Alec.

"We believe that David is associated, somehow, with the vampires of the Hotel Dumont. For some reason, though, I have not been able to make contact with him in the past few days." Alec paused for a moment, looking like he was remembering something, but when he spoke again the subject was on something slightly different.

"There has been suspicious activity around the area of the hotel in the past couple of days. At this meeting's end, those of you who are willing will split into two groups and assist with investigating the area of the hotel and the Institute of Stamford, Connecticut. There were hooded figures spotted there last night."

After that, Alec opened the floor to anyone who had any comments or those who just wanted to voice their opinions on any of the subject matter that was discussed earlier. Among those who had things to say was Luke.

"I believe that whoever is behind all of this is pretty new at this. We are not going against the second coming of Sebastian, here. And I don't say this to imply that those we are facing are weak, or to be taken lightly in any way. In fact, until we learn more, the lack of savvy might actually be disadvantageous to us. It makes them unpredictable. I'd advise everyone to please take extra precautions."

Alec was nodding his head throughout Luke's speech. "And that makes it imperative for us to find some type of hard evidence to pinpoint who we are dealing with and to see what we are up against." Alec clapped his hands once.

"Alright. If there is nothing else, everyone is free to leave unless you would like to help on one of the missions."

Most people decided to stick around to help investigate the areas that the suspicious activity was reported. I approached Alexander.

"Would you like me to come with you? I can make you a portal." I asked, hoping I didn't sound as pathetic as I did in my own head.

"Actually, it would be helpful if you could summon weapons from the Institute for us. Then, can you actually go with the Connecticut group?"

"Oh. Ok. Yeah. I can do that." I concentrated for a moment, then snapped my fingers. "There. Your weapons are ready."

"Its just- I'm going to the hotel. Izzy is mad at me and volunteered to go to Stamford, just to spite me, probably. Simon will go with her, of course, but apparently she's mad at him, too. If you went, I wouldn't have to worry about her as much."

"Isabelle doesn't like me, either, at the moment." I reminded him.

"Still, she can't avoid everyone if she expects to be included in this."

"Ok. I'll go to Stamford. You just keep yourself safe. Please."

Alexander took a step closer to me. He reached for my hand and squeezed it briefly. "You be careful, too, Magnus. Return home."

My breath caught as he looked at me. Hope spread through my chest. I gave Alec a small smile.

Guess who interrupted us? Jace.

"Are we gonna get going or what?"

"Yes, Rapunzel… Or do you actually prefer Goldilocks?" I tapped my finger to my chin. "Hmm. Which one is prettier?'

Alec gave the tinniest of smiles, while Jace continued to scowl at me. Alec turned to Jace. "Magnus is going to portal the other group to Connecticut. He'll make sure Izzy stays safe."

Jace nodded at me, then stalked over to arm himself with as many daggers and seraph blades as he could carry.

* * *

We arrived in downtown Stamford about 45 minutes later. Of Pablo's friends, Alondra and Angelo ended up joining me, along with two of the shadowhunters from New Jersey and Simon and Isabelle. Three werewolves came along, as well, included the angry one from earlier, named Nik.

I'd portaled us a few blocks away from the Institute so that we could split into three groups and canvas around the building and work our way in toward it.

I was not sure if I was hoping to run into the enemy or not. A big part of me just wanted to make contact with these guys and see what they wanted. The whole guessing game thing was starting to get on my nerves.

Although I wasn't really looking forward to it, I insisted on walking with Isabelle and Simon. I could tell she didn't want to come with me, but she probably didn't want to come off as a bratty child in front of the other shadowhunters and downworlders assembled amongst us.

We walked in silence for the first 15 minutes. I was completely comfortable with not talking, but poor Simon looked even more awkward than normal. I had to try to break the ice.

"So, Simon, my good man. What's up with you?" Not my best stuff, but he responded immediately.

"Um... nothing. I guess. " Simon replied, looking at Isabelle.

I looked at her, too, but she just ignored me like I wasn't there. How rude.

"So do you have any theories on what the vampires are up to?"

Simon's head popped up. He looked at me as if he hadn't been paying much attention. "Me? I wouldn't know what's going on with them."

Isabelle finally spoke up. Angrily, I might add. "Of course Simon doesn't know anything about it. He's too busy keeping secrets. Aren't you, Simon?"

Well, alright.

"Let's not talk about this right now. We have a job to do." Simon answered, a bit heatedly himself.

"Guys, I don't mean to interrupt this little domestic quibble, but I do hope you're paying attention to our surroundings." I said to them. We did have a job to do, as Simon put it, and their attention was required.

By that point, though, we were very close to coming up on the Institute. I could see that the others were done and standing around waiting for us to return. Simon and Isabelle had fallen behind, probably due to their to their mutual sulking, but not by much.

Suddenly I heard a noise behind me. I turned around but I didn't see anything. That didn't stop the goosebumps from rising on the back of my neck. Something was surely about to go down.

"Simon, Isabelle!" I yelled at them. "Get up here, now!"

I drew my hand out in front of me and did a spell that amplified a signal sent to the others to be on alert. And not a moment too soon either.

I was about 20 feet from the others when I saw three figures dressed in all black creeping up behind group assembled in front of the institute. The element of surprise was ruined for the attackers, so the group had no problem fighting them back.

I turned my attention back to Simon and Isabelle and did a double take.

"Simon- where is Isabelle?"

Simon's head whipped around fast enough that it looked painful. "Oh my God- she was just right here. Magnus! You've got to help me find her."

Simon and I started retracing our steps, running hurriedly back the way we had just came. The girl was nowhere to be found.

I stopped short and took a deep breath. I knew I had to find Isabelle. I had promised Alec that I would keep her safe and to be honest I really cared for the girl, no matter how she felt about me for the moment.

I closed my eyes and focused on everything that I knew about Isabelle. Soon, I was able to perform a modified tracking spell on her.

"Simon. Follow me. We must hurry."

I knew we would never catch up to whoever had taken Isabelle on foot so I made a portal that would take us two blocks down quickly and Simon and I ran through it.

Once we were out, I immediately saw two black clad figures carrying a very unconscious Isabelle down an alley.

I drew my hand out once more and cast a spell that gave the mysterious figures a brief but intense burning sensation. Knowing that this might be our best chance at it, as my magical energy was beginning to wane, I called to Simon.

"Get her. Go as fast as you can back to the others."

Simon snatched his girlfriend from the figures and half carried- half dragged her back from the way we came. I tied the attackers up with an enchanted rope that would lift them up, making it easier for me to take them back to the others.

They had been successful in handling the other three mysterious figures, fortunately, causing them to retreat. Angelo had even been able to steal a bag that one of the figures were clutching in his (or her) hands. We decided to portal back to Alec's apartment to decide the next course of action.

* * *

Alec, Jace, Simon, and Clary were sitting at Alec's dining room table, discussing the events that had just happened.

I could easily hear everything they were saying from Alec's room, where I was checking on Isabelle every few minutes. She had a pretty serious concussion and I wanted to make sure my magic was doing its job and making it go away safely.

"I can't believe Magnus captured two faeries." Jace was saying.

"I can't believe you guys didn't see any action." Simon said to him.

"He's so pissed, too." Clary said. I could hear the smile in her voice.

"Well, the two faeries, along with the bag of smoke is evidence enough to get the rest of the Clave involved." Alec said. "That was actually dad I was talking to earlier. He said there is a meeting in session right now and they will probably be dispatching a bunch of shadowhunters here by morning."

"She's awake." I called out to them.

Isabelle's eyes searched the room as they all entered the room.

"What just happened?" She asked.

Alec spoke up. "You got attacked, Izzy. Do you remember any of it?"

"I didn't see anything at all. I only remember being grabbed from behind, and then nothing."

Simon's face held a strange mixture of concern and anger. "Magnus saved you. He was way more observant than anyone else out there."

Isabelle looked at me. "Thank you." She said, quite stiffly.

I told her that she was well enough to leave and then left Alec's bedroom to set up my bed in the living room. I didn't even know if I would be needed anymore that night, but I was ready to relax and turn in early.

"Hey, Magnus?" Simon was right behind me.

"Yeah." I really didn't feel like talking. I was worn out from the long day and the sheer amount of magic that I had performed in such a short period of time.

Simon gave me a measured look. "How did you track Izzy earlier?"

"With magic. Maybe you haven't been paying attention, but I'm a warlock."

"Funny." Simon deadpanned. "You know what I mean."

Jace and Alec had joined us by then and they were all looking at me.

I cleared my throat. "I may have made it more convenient for me to track you guys."

Alec eyes widened as he looked at me. "When did you do that?"

"A while ago. Right after we broke up." I sighed and pressed on. "I was having a very difficult time not knowing where you were and if you were ok. Its complicated to explain how I did it but, I created a spell that would make easier to track you, Alexander. Now, I only have to focus my thoughts on you as I do the spell, and I know exactly where you are and what physical state you are in."

It was Jace who spoke up first. "But you said 'you guys'. You did that for all of us?"

"Yes. I mean, let's not get mushy here. The idea was born more out of my affection towards Alec than to any feelings that I may harbor towards any of the rest of you."

Jace smirked at me knowingly. Simon's cheeks reddened faintly. I didn't have them fooled.

"Ok, I guess in normal circumstances I might find that a little stalkerish, but you saved my sister. I'm not gonna complain." Jace said.

"Hey." Clary said, coming out of Alec's room. "Izzy's ready to go. I think we should head back."

You're right. We've still got to patrol tonight, too." Jace turned his head to look at me. "Do you think you can come with us to put some extra wards on the Institute?"

I was just formulating the proper response when Alec came to my rescue.

"Can't you see that he's tired? He's been using magic all evening."

"Alright. Don't get your panties in a bunch, Alec."

Alec gave him the old Lightwood glare. He pulled out his cell phone. "I'm calling Pablo. I'm sure he can do it."

Alec walked away to make the call. Once he was done he reminded his siblings to be safe and followed them to the door to say goodbye.

I got up from the couch to finally put my bed up.

"Should you be using magic right now."

"I am getting very low on energy, but I'm nowhere near the point of passing out." I said. "Thanks for being concerned, though."

"Or you could just use my bed. I'll take the couch."

"You're too sweet to me, but I can't take your bed."

"Just consider it returning the favor from earlier." Alec said with a small smile.

My thoughts went back to earlier this morning when I found a very naked and sexy shadowhunter lying in my bed. I wasn't going to comment on it, however, because Alexander might not have appreciated it. Also, because I really didn't have the energy to bother.

"If I use your bed will you agree to continue our conversation from earlier in the morning?" I asked.

Alec stepped up to me and took my hand. "Yes. We can talk in the morning."

He lead me to his bedroom. "Sleep tight." He said. He watched as I lay down and placed his hand over the light switch.

He changed his mind at the last moment and came over to me to place a soft kiss on my forehead.

I smiled as I closed my eyes, enveloped in Alexander's familiar scent, and welcomed the sweet, cloudy bliss of sleep.

* * *

 **Thanks you guys for the reviews, favs and follows. They make me so happy!**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	10. Chapter 10

**Thanks to those who favorite, follow, and review.** **I** **love you bunches!**

 **Please enjoy!**

 **I don't own TMI**

* * *

I didn't end up getting to sleep until after midnight last night, what with all of the phone calls I had made and received and reports that I'd had to file. Plus, I had responded to a couple reports of demon activity close to my apartment. Nothing difficult, just a few ravener demons that some warlock, who was clearly in over his head, lost control of during a summoning.

Still, I was up by 6AM on Saturday morning, drinking coffee in the kitchen. I had woken up about 15 minutes prior to that and quietly gone into my room to get a change of clothing before showering in the main bathroom.

That really only took me about 5 minutes. I wouldn't admit this to anyone, but I'd actually stood in front of the mirror for 10 minutes, messing around with my hair, debating if I should find some gel to put in it. In the end, I just scowled at my reflection and ran out of there. Even if I did have hair gel, I wouldn't know what to do with it.

That was how I found myself in the kitchen, standing over my sink, as I did almost every morning since I'd moved in here, trying to think about more pressing issues. Issues, at least more serious than trying to improve my look for certain warlocks who probably wouldn't wake for another 4 to 6 hours.

As I expected, there were plenty of shadowhunters dispatched to the Institute, which meant that my job had shrunk dramatically overnight.

Now that the Clave was officially involved, I was expected to take a step back to make room for whoever they'd assigned take the lead in putting a stop to the faeries and vampires.

On the one hand, I was relieved that the Clave was finally stepping in to help. Anything we could do to stop our enemies before we had another full-blown war to deal with was welcome in my book. But, on the other hand, I didn't exactly like being relegated to the sidelines.

It was funny, in a sort of ironic way. I used to love to stick to the background. I wanted nothing more than to let others shine while I watched their backs for them and made sure they stayed safe. And while I didn't particularly want to do any shining, necessarily, I was beginning to discover that I could be as effective in the forefront as I could in the background. Maybe even more, in some instances.

I leaned up on my toes to catch a glimpse of the sun just beginning to peak above the tall buildings in the distance through the tiny window above the sink. I sighed and headed into my office to start on a schedule of things that needed done for the week ahead.

To my shock, Magnus came strolling in at about 7:30.

"Good morning." Magnus mumbled as he gingerly sat down in the stiff little chair in front of the desk.

"Good morning. Are you feeling any better?" I asked, frowning at him. He looked tired still.

"Yes. Much better, thank you. Your room is free now."

"You didn't have to get up early on my account. Feel free to get some more rest."

Magnus sighed. "I woke up an hour ago and couldn't get back to sleep. I have a lot on my mind."

"Oh? Like what?"

He began to fidget in his chair. "Well, for starters, I don't think I fed the Chairman yesterday…"

I resisted rolling my eyes. "I noticed he didn't have any food so I got some. I fed him this morning."

"Ah. Thanks…"

I nodded, folding my arms over my chest. "Well, now that we've solved that problem, what else is on your mind?"

"Lots of things." Magnus stared down at his hands in his lap.

I lifted my eyebrows. This was obviously going to take some prodding. "Go on."

"I really don't know how or where to start."

"If this is going were I think its going, then let's head into the living room, where its more comfortable, to talk." I got up from my chair and led the way out of the office. After a few seconds, Magnus followed.

"It's a little unnerving how different you are now." Magnus said, once he sat down on the couch with a stolen cup of coffee, across from where I sat on a recliner.

"What do you mean?"

Your confidence. You barely had any before, unless you were fighting demons and protecting the people you care for. The hesitant, second-guessing guy I once knew is gone. In his place is a brave young man with endless potential."

Magnus' voice had turned emotional as he spoke. I could tell he meant what he said.

"A lot has happened in the past few months. I wouldn't be much of a person if I didn't learn a few things." I tried to shrug his compliments off.

"Trust me when I say that there are plenty of people who are dumb enough to learn nothing from their experiences." Magnus lowered his head. "I've been so stupid."

I wasn't used to him admitting things like this, but he was finally getting to what was really on his mind.

"It was my fault, Alec. I should have trusted you. Given you more information." Magnus continued.

"You're talking about Camille?" I asked.

"I should have expected for you to be curious. And I should have known that she would try to manipulate you." His head lifted and his eyes found mine.

I interrupted him. "Yes. You should have. But we both made mistakes in that situation."

Magnus laughed a bit, but it was humorless. "It just took me so long to realize it. Maybe Catarina is right. Maybe I do need to grow up still."

His self-pity was beginning to worry me. In the time that I had know him, he'd always been the one, of the two of us, who was the most forthcoming in his feelings, but that was always strictly limited to confessions of love. Any deep feelings that Magnus had about other matters were hidden safely away behind his sarcasm and quit wit.

An emotionally exposed Magnus was something foreign to me.

"Magnus. Everybody needs to grow. Even centuries-old warlocks. That, in and of itself, is not a big deal."

Magnus shook his head. "Nice try, but you don't have to coddle me. It is a big deal. Look at what my childishness has done to you. To us. The only question that remains is why you are still willing to even look at me."

Magnus slung his head back onto the couch cushions. "Maybe I don't even deserve you."

I rose quickly to my feet. "That's enough, Magnus. Your pity-party is starting to get on my nerves." I knew I was being harsh, but he seemed like he needed a dose of reality.

I walked over to the couch and sat down, sideways, so that I could face him. "I don't want to hear you say anything so false ever again." I said sharply.

Magnus lifted his head up and his eyes, which were now shining, found mine again. "Are you saying there is still a chance for us?" He asked softly.

I scooted a little closer to him and he turned his body to face me.

"I believe you just admitted to your share of mistakes in our relationship. I admitted to mine, as well. And I think we have both learned what happens when we refuse to address problems and don't communicate. Do you agree?"

Magnus nodded. "I do."

I took his hand in mine. "Then yes." I ran my thumb along the back of his fingers and smiled softly. "I think there's a chance for us."

His smile was so beautiful. He reached up with his free hand to grip the back of my neck lightly. "Alexander, would you agree to going on a date with me?"

I smiled back at him. "Yes."

Magnus began to wiggle his way over to close the distance left between us. He slid easily into my lap. "I see. Would you agree to letting me kiss you right now?"

I sucked in a shaky breath and licked my lips while staring at his. "Yes. Please."

And then we were kissing. This wasn't our first kiss since breaking up by any means, but this kiss felt special. We were finally taking the steps that were necessary to be together again.

Weight was lifted off of my shoulders and I felt so good. Magnus' hands roaming all over my chest and biceps and his tongue in my mouth probably had something to do with how good I was feeling, too.

I pulled away from him to speak. "I've missed you." I ran my hands up and down Magnus' back.

"I've missed you, too, sweetie-pie." He placed a couple of kisses right below my ear before nuzzling my neck.

"Although, now I have to put up with your silly nicknames again and spend my down time trying to get rid of the glitter you shed all over me. And then there's your almost unbearable flamboyancy, in general." I joked, pretending to mull it over.

Magnus lifted up from my neck and glared at me, but I could see the smile that was creeping into his expression. "I am not flamboyant."

I snorted. "Ok, Magnus. What would you call it, then?"

He shrugged, putting his hands on his hips and effectively recovering all of the sassiness that had gone missing from his personality as of late. "I'm magnificent."

I rolled my eyes in amusement.

"I would have also accepted brilliant, glamourous, or, if you were really being honest, gloriously and unabashedly dashing." He continued.

"How about pretentious, ostentatious, gaudy…" I muttered under my breath.

Magnus slapped my shoulder and pouted.

"You're lucky you're so cute." I said.

"You know you love it."

My hands dropped lower until I could feel his perfectly round ass in my grip. I pulled his body into mine as close as I could get it and basically ground him against me. "I do love it." I whispered in his ear.

Magnus' head lolled back and he moaned lowly. I knew where this was destined to lead to. I just didn't know if it would be smart to dive into the more physical aspects of our relationship just yet.

I think Magnus sensed my hesitation. "Maybe we should give ourselves more time to talk and date for a bit, hmm?"

"Or, we just go for it." I didn't want to stop touching Magnus. I moved my hands to his hips and roll them against me while shifting my own hips. "Resisting you has not been easy."

"Mmmm… No. But making up isn't easy, either." Magnus regained control of himself and moved my hands away from his hips. "There's always the possibility of going too fast, making too many assumptions, getting it all wrong. I think if we withhold sex we might have more motivation to get this right."

"Fine. You're gonna have to get off my lap, then." I huffed at him. I knew he was right and I wanted what was best for us in the long run.

Magnus laughed, getting up. "I need to shower anyway. And don't worry, grumpy-butt, we will be together in every way soon enough." He winked at me and sashayed into my bedroom.

I vowed right then to repay him earnestly for being such a tease. Before I let myself think about that too much, though, I texted Jace to see if anything interesting was going on at the Institute.

He texted back a few minutes later to complain that none of the shadowhunters would give him any information. Probably because of his age. He still had a while yet before he was 18.

I told Jace that I would be heading over there shortly.

I went into my bedroom to ask Magnus if he wanted to join me at the Institute.

He seemed to hesitate as he processed my offer. "Actually, I have a couple clients to meet with and I still have to do my makeup and hair. Then, I have something that I need to work on here. If that's alright?"

"That's fine. I'll fill you in later, ok?" When Magnus nodded, I added. "If you're not busy tonight, we can get dinner or drinks or something…"

"That sounds nice." Magnus smiled at me.

We spent the next 10 minutes alternating between the two of us making out and me trying to drag myself out of Magnus' warm embrace. Finally, after things got supercharged and heated again, I tore my lips away from his and promised to see him later on that night.

* * *

When I finally made it to the Institute, the front hall was strangely empty. I walked toward the library thinking that maybe there was a meeting happening. Before I could make there, Izzy stopped me.

"Hi." She said.

"Hi."

"Look, Alec. I'm sorry for being so bitchy the other day…"

I held my hands up in surrender. "Its ok. I've been distracted lately. I guess I haven't been a good brother."

"You have been distracted, but you've been working. I've just been acting like a brat because Simon's been hiding things from me."

"What's he been hiding." I asked, frowning at the thought of Simon hurting my little sister.

"Nothing, really. Just personal stuff, feelings. Like, he won't tell me how he feels about his family. I know there's something going on with his mother, but he wants to keep certain things private."

If anyone could relate to how Izzy was feeling, it was me. "Give Simon the chance to open up to you when he is ready. He's been dealing with a lot of stuff lately." Going from mundane to vampire to mundane to shadowhunter, all in matter of months had to have been a lot to cope with.

"Just make sure he knows that you want him to tell you everything and let him know why its important to you. Make sure to be as honest with him as you want him to be with you."

Izzy looked at me, searching my eyes. "Thanks, Alec. That's good advice."

I smiled at her. "Where is everybody?" I asked.

"All the new arrivals are in the library. But Simon, Jace, and Clary are up in my room. I was just grabbing some snacks."

I grabbed the food out of her hands and we walked toward the elevator together.

Once we were inside and riding it up, she cocked her head towards me.

"Why do you seem so happy?"

"What makes you think I'm happy?"

"Well, you're not exactly smiling, or anything, but you're also not all gloom and doom, like usual."

"'Gloom and doom', seriously?" I made a face at her.

She laughed as we got off the elevator and walked to her room. "Did you finally manage to seduce Magnus, or what?"

I knew my red face was probably giving me away, but I still defended myself. "I have not seduced Magnus, nor have I been trying to do so."

Izzy just giggled and walked through the open door of her room. "Alec, you don't have to hide it. Or be so defensive. We all know you two are going to get back together. I mean, come on. You guys are living together again."

"His apartment is still ruined." I reminded her. I threw the bags of chips I was holding on to Izzy's desk.

"Couldn't Magnus stay somewhere else, though? Or like, pop a house into existence wherever he wanted to?" Simon piped up. He was sitting on top of the clothing that Izzy had strewn all over her bed.

I glared at him and then tried to change the subject.

"Do you guys know when everyone will be done with that meeting? I want to see what information I can get from them."

"Maryse said they'd probably be in there until the early afternoon." Jace said, standing next to the window with his arms folded. "It took you a while to get here. What kept you? A certain sparkly guy?"

I turned my glare onto my parabatai. "I'm going upstairs to put in an hour or so of training." I turned to leave the room.

"Why are you guys always so mean to Alec?" Clary came to my defense.

"He makes it too easy." Jace said.

"Yeah, he does." Izzy added.

Clary looked at me. "Do you mind if I join you? I could use another hour of training."

"Sure." I said. "Let's go."

Clary got up from her seat only to have Jace grab her arm and pull her to him. "I thought we were going to hang out." He whined.

"Eat your chips, Jace. We have all day to hang out." She left him sulking at the window.

Clary and I separated to change into workout clothing. We met up again in the training room.

I started off by doing some stretches before performing some squats and pushups. I usually started that way since training with Jace meant a lot of hand to hand combat practice and I was always better off when I warmed up first.

I turned to Clary. She had been practicing some agility exercises.

"Alright. Pick your poison."

"Uh. What?"

"You wanted to train, so I'm putting you to work. You get to pick what we do, though."

"Oh." Clary said, seeming a bit surprised. "I thought we would just do separate things, but ok. Do you want to practice hand to hand?"

I smiled at her. "I see Jace is rubbing off on you."

"Oh no!" Clary said, her hand clutching her chest in mock horror.

"Just don't let it happen again." I laughed. "Now, let's do this."

Clary got low into her stance and I had to resist the urge to coo at her. (I really don't remember the last time I cooed at anything, though.) She looked like a cute little red kitten. I'd seen her in battle, though. She still had a ways to go in her training, but she was fierce and relentless. And she was learning everything at a fast clip.

Clary and I sparred for the next 45 minutes, both of us working up a heavy sweat.

"You're doing great." I told her. "When you get attacked from the left, just make sure you don't neglect to cover your right side, alright?"

Clary collapsed to the mat and accepted the bottled water that I grabbed for her. "Thanks, Alec. I appreciate you helping me like that."

"It was actually fun." I smiled at her while recovering my breathing. "Will you tell the others that I'm going to go find out what's going on at that meeting even if I have to just barge in."

"Alright. I've gotta go find Jace, anyway, to make sure he hasn't melted into a puddle of pure angst."

A half hour later, after I'd showered and changed, I found my mother in her office.

"I'd appreciated if you'd invite me to meetings that are directly related to my job, mother."

Maryse looked up from her paperwork. "Alec, I know you are grown now, but I am still your mother. The others can handle this now, anyway. I'm afraid things are getting too dangerous. Your sister almost got kidnapped the other day."

"You keeping me and the others ignorant will only make it more likely that one of us gets attacked by the enemy."

"Maybe I should cut down on the patrolling that you kids do."

I cut my eyes to her. "Do what you feel you need with them, but I think I need to remind you that I make the decision on just how much patrolling I do. We talked about this, mother. I thought we understood each other."

Maryse stood up, walked around her desk and pulled me into an abrupt hug. Before I could even react, she pulled away, straightening out her blazer awkwardly. "I'm sorry, Alexander. I know I shouldn't treat you like this, but I just can't lose another child. I look at you and I see what Max could have been if his life hadn't been stolen."

She turned her back to me, probably so I wouldn't be able to see her looking so vulnerable. "I know its not fair to you. I just don't know how else to deal with this."

For the second time that day, I was dealing with someone who wanted nothing more than to pour all of their emotions out on me. I sighed. "I know, mom. I understand how you feel when you think about Max." It was still hard for me to say his name.

"But I can't hide behind that fear. I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I knew I wasn't doing everything in my power to stop people like the vermin that took my little brother from me. We can't afford to let fear immobilize us."

My mother just stood there with her back to me. Her shoulders shook very lightly. I was at a loss at what I should be doing. I didn't know whether to a step forward to comfort her or to just leave the room to give my mother privacy.

I made the decision to go to her. I knew that she had been dealing with things, mostly by herself, for some time. My parents were on the outs and everyone with eyes saw it.

Just when I was about to reach out to pat my mother on her shoulder she spoke. "The meeting was to discuss what the prisoners revealed."

She sounded composed. She sounded normal, as if she had not just been on the cusp of breaking down.

Maryse continued. "The faeries that Magnus captured? We think they were affected by some new strand of faerie smoke that made them servants of someone else. At first they kept repeating 'We are getting stronger. We will defeat you'. The smoke wore off and now they are not talking at all. The meeting was to determine how to get answers out of them." She finished her impromptu ramble with a heavy sigh.

I jumped at the chance to get information from her. "What decision did everybody come to?"

"A consensus wasn't reached." She pinched the bridge of her nose. "You know by now how things work with the Clave. The meeting will be continued here tomorrow at 9AM. Please make yourself available to attend. Your perspective is something that others should consider in this matter."

I stood looking at my mother, trying to disguise the shock that I felt. It was like she was giving me her blessing to be an adult and be involved in the very real and very dangerous issues that were plaguing the Clave right now. Also, she was acknowledging the fact that I had a viewpoint that was unique and that I had the potential to be helpful to the Clave. She was giving me an actual complement in her own way.

"I'll be here." I told her. "Thanks." I said.

She responded by giving my a small, pinched smile- it really looked more like a painful grimace, but I knew better- and turning her back on me again.

I left her, at that point, to be alone with her thoughts. I went to find the others to go out and grab something to eat.

We ended up spending most of the afternoon that followed at Taki's, just eating and talking ourselves hoarse about possible theories of what could be going on with the faeries and vampires.

Jace, sitting in our crowded booth next to Clary, was just complaining for the 49th time about not seeing any action on our trip to the Hotel Dumont, when something began to click in my head.

"Jace. What did you just say?" I asked, looking up from the slice of cherry pie that Izzy and I were sharing.

"I said I wish I had the foresight to go with the right group." Jace threw me a disgusted look. "If you'd give me as much attention as you're giving that foul pie, maybe you'd have heard me."

"Don't take it out on the pie, man." Simon chided him. "I think most of Alec's attention is on his phone, anyway."

This started them off on a tangent of speculation about my love life again. Truthfully speaking, I had been texting with Magnus since we had arrived at Taki's a couple hours ago, and obviously I'd not been as discreet as I thought.

Under normal circumstances, I would have gone all red in the face and denied things, while trying to send the focus to someone or something else. This time, though, I barely paid attention. Something about what Jace had said was triggering something in my memory.

"Foresight." I said.

"Yeah, Alec. I said that word about five minutes ago. You gotta keep up." Jace said.

Clary was giving me a look as if she knew what I was getting at. "Leave him alone. I think he's trying to remember something."

I slowly nodded my head. "Do you guys remember the names of any shops or restaurants around the Hotel Dumont?" The thought that I was trying to recall had something to do either with that hotel and the vampires that lived there or a place near it.

"Its almost a ghost town around there." Simon said, frowning in memory of the place.

"Yeah, there's only abandoned buildings in that area." Izzy said.

"Oh, foresight!" Clary piped up. "There's a dilapidated old building a couple blocks away from the hotel. I noticed it yesterday, when Jace and I were patrolling with the rest of the group. It's all boarded up, but someone spray-painted 'foresight' one of the boards. I remember it because I stopped and looked at it."

"You never told me why you did that, by the way." Jace said.

Clary's cheeks turned lightly pink. "I liked the way it looked. The design was unique. And it's really faded, like its been there for a long time. But what's the significance of all that, Alec?"

I had only been listening for a while, as a memory came back to me. "We're going to the Hotel Dumont."

* * *

About an hour and a half later Jace, Clary, Simon, Izzy and I were on our way to the hotel. Although I made it clear that our trip was purely a recon mission, I insisted that we head back to the Institute to get more weapons and apply new runes just in case we encountered any trouble. I texted Magnus to meet us there since, if my hunch was right, the building would have spells against intruders.

"So tell me what we're doing again." Simon asked.

"It's something that David said to me when I first met him. He mentioned something about his brother and he said the world 'foresight'. I don't know; the way he said it made it sound like it was some secret place or something." I said.

I knew this trip could -and probably would- prove fruitless. That was why I didn't mention it to my mother or to any of the other shadowhunters.

"So basically, we're going all the way across town just to look at some tag that someone left on some old derelict building just because some guy, who is connected to the vamps in some way, said something that might possibly be construed as a clue to what has been going on. But we probably won't find anything and just on a wild goose chase." Jace deadpanned.

My eyes snapped up to his. I nodded, slowly. "Yeah, that's pretty much it."

I looked down at my phone again. Magnus had not texted me back yet, and it had been almost two hours.

"What's wrong?" Izzy asked me, after she saw me frowning.

"Magnus hasn't answered my request to meet up with us."

"But you too were just texting earlier."

"I know. That's why its so strange."

"Maybe he's just busy with a client."

"He's been done with clients since 5:30. Anyway, he would still answer me."

"I'm sure Magnus is not just blowing you off, Alec."

Izzy and I had been very affectionate to each other since making up this morning, but this was weird. A couple days ago she had been almost to the point of spitting at the mention of Magnus' name; now she was defending him.

"I more worried that something is wrong. What happened to you hating him?" I asked her.

"Magnus saved me. That tends to make me reevaluate things. I was just so mad at him for how the situation was affecting you. And how stubborn he was being. I mean, you two belong together."

"We're working it out. Finally."

We retraced the path that Jace and Clary had made yesterday.

"This is it." Clary called back to me.

I jogged up to the building that Clary was indicating. It was tagged with spray paint like I remembered. I checked my phone once more. Magnus still hadn't contacted me.

"Try to find a way in, but let's stick close together." I told them since we weren't learning anything from standing around out front.

We checked the front of the building first. Jace, Simon and I tried to pry at some of the boards, but they didn't even budge.

"What the hell!" Jace yelled in frustration. "I should be able to get that free on my own."

"A warlock must have warded this building. I figured as much." I said.

"Let's go around back. There's got to be a way in." Jace said.

"This is pointless." Simon muttered. I don't think he liked being so close to the vampire hangout.

I was the last to round the corner of the building so when I heard a loud bang, I was the only one who followed the sound back out front.

I got back to the street in time to see a slim somebody slip from behind the boarded up door. The person, who looked like a guy, didn't see me at first. He noticed me at the same time that I figured out who I was looking at.

It was a vampire.

It was David.

* * *

 **Thanks for reading!**


	11. Chapter 11

**Hey, this is a short chapter, but I believe it serves it's purpose well enough.**

 **Thanks, you guys for the favs, follows, and reviews. Thanks, also for just reading. I really appreciate it.**

 **I have a favor to ask you guys, after you read this, in the a/n at the bottom.**

 **I don't own TMI**

* * *

"Magnus!" A female voice came urgently to me. Somehow that voice managed to scream and whisper at the same time.

I tried to turn my head to where I thought the sound was originating, but I couldn't move much. There was not even a word for the way I felt. The words miserable and atrocious came to mind, briefly, but those just didn't do justice.

My head was pounding heavier than I'd ever felt it. I couldn't open my eyes and that was concerning. When I finally managed to move them slightly, it felt like something, probably blood, was drying on my face.

As time wore on I slowly became acclimated to my surroundings and to how much pain I was in. I found that my ribs were definitely fractured and my left arm was underneath me in a way that made it clear that my shoulder was dislocated.

My mind was groggy to the point where I knew that I was under the influence of a very strong drug.

It is really difficult to drug a warlock. The magic within battles any drug, injury, or sickness until it is gone. Even if the warlock is asleep or unconscious.

The person that drugged me must have somehow found a way to drain my magical energy first or just overloaded my system to the point where the drug overcame my magic.

The weird thing was that I could feel my magic trying to fight off the foreign substance in my body, but it felt like the drug kept getting stronger and my energy weaker.

So I just laid there while my consciousness came and went and I had no idea what was going on inside of me or if I would be able to fight this off.

Maybe I was dying.

I kept hearing the female voice, but I couldn't understand what she was saying most of the time.

I felt a wave of nausea, suddenly, and then blackness once again.

When I came around again my grogginess was sufficiently lower. The first thing I noticed was how much more aware of the pain I was. My ribs and head were still pounding. My arm just felt numb. The good thing was that I could tell that my magic was finally getting the upper hand in its battle against the drug, if only very slightly.

With that thought giving me a glimmer of hope, I tried to survey my environment. The room I was in was very small and contained no furniture. Only lumps on the ground.

One of the lumps stirred.

"Magnus?" A hoarse whisper came.

"Maia?" I croaked out. Fuck! I'd been kidnapped.

Ok, well, I guess I had already sensed that as soon as I woke up, but now I knew for sure.

Maia crawled laboriously over to where I was. It looked really difficult since she had to dodge other lumps (bodies?) on the floor to get to me.

"Magnus, I'm glad you're awake, but you have to be quiet. Once they know you're awake, they'll just use you again." She'd stopped whispering, but she kept her voice very quiet so as not to be overheard by whoever was keeping us.

"Where are we? What have they been doing to you?"

"I don't know where we are. But, I do know that they are using us to make that faery smoke."

"I've been around for a long time, but the last time the Clave had to deal with anybody using faery smoke predates even me."

"Really? That explains why they are doing so many experiments."

"From what I've heard about the stuff, the people who first discovered the means of creating the smoke ended up killing themselves accidentally. That was only after taking out many of other downworlders and shadowhunters, first."

I really didn't know too many of the details surrounding the people who created the smoke. Only that it was some faeries and a warlock. These people had only succeeded in making two kinds, according to the legends. The first was the kind that was currently being used (and was used on my apartment building). The other kind was one that had to be ingested. It was used as a relatively mild form of mind control.

I related all of that to Maia.

"What is unknown is how they actually went about making it. Although, there are theories that involved killing people." I finished telling her what I knew, still mindful of being quiet.

"They almost killed Bat." Maia said, looking furious. "The drained him to the point where he's no more than a vegetable. I'm worried that he wont wake up, or, if he does, I'm worried that he wont be the same."

Maia crept over to a door that I hadn't noticed earlier. It had a small and dirty window near the top of it that she looked through. "Looks like the guard is sleeping now. No one will come in for a few hours."

Something wasn't quite adding up, in my opinion. "So, who are all these others here?" I pointed to the others on the floor. "Are they all drained? Like Bat?"

"Mostly pack-less werewolves and a couple of mundanes. All male. And yes, they are all drained and no better than vegetables at this point."

"You've been in here as long as Bat has. Why are you not in the same state as the others?" Not that I wished it on her, or anything, I just didn't know how she had managed consciousness where no one else had.

Maia snorted. "They seriously wouldn't touch me when I first got here. They don't seem to think females are strong enough to withstand their torture. At least not enough to provide enough of whatever substance they are mining from our bodies." She looked pissed enough to bitch-slap the next person who looked at her funny.

"Anyway, I've been using that to my advantage. Whenever they would take Bat, or any of the others, I couldn't see anything. But I could hear everything. The screams would get louder and louder until the person was hoarse and was begging them to stop." Maia looked up at me.

"So when they took me, after they had no other options, and their kidnapping attempts didn't bring in any other prisoners, I pretended to be weaker than I am. I pretend to be able to take less torture than I actually can. So I stay strong, well, strongish. I think they might be starting to catch on, though, so I need to try to escape soon. Maybe you can do the same and we can escape this place."

I nodded "I'm all for escaping. If we have a few hours before they come back in, I'm sure I will have enough magical energy by then-"

"No! Don't attempt any magic-not yet. Try to save as much energy as you can. They pump the smoke in through the vents every now and then to keep us weak, so you probably won't have enough magic to do much." Maia explained, looking a bit defeated.

"We'll figure out something."

"Magnus, just don't give them any reason to hurt you even further. You must have put up a hell of a fight for them to have kicked your ass like that." She eyed my injuries.

"Actually, I don't remember being kidnapped. I was doing a favor for a client who claimed to have an emergency. He wanted to meet at some seedy-looking diner, but I didn't think much of it. I went in and ordered a cocktail and that's absolutely all I remember."

"Oh. Well anyway, the vampires sort of have the upper hand, it seems. They and the fae don't get along at all. The vamps are barbaric and look for any excuse to add their own personal physical torture to the what we already have to go through when they drain us to make the smoke."

"Maia, I might seem snarky and sarcastic all the time, but I'm nothing if not a self-preservationist. I'll be fine. I'm more worried about you. How long do you think you've got until you're not waking up?"

At that moment the door suddenly opened and two people walked in.

"Magnus Bane. After all this time, I finally have you here with me. Please say you'll join me." A laugh. "We are going to have so much fun."

* * *

 **A/N**

 **Soooo, I was wondering if you guys could do me a favor. If you feel like it, could you please tell me what you think I need to work on in my writing? I love all the nice comments, but I would love some criticism. I know there is plenty of room for some, so just leave one on here or shoot me a pm (if you have the time or desire to do so.)**

 **I am going back and editing my chapters for errors. I want to have that done by the end of the day, but lawd, it took me all of forever to just do the first chapter...**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	12. Chapter 12

**I don't own TMI**

* * *

 _David_.

I stood facing the old building about 20 feet away from the guy who had been a mundane less than a week ago.

David looked different. His skin was even more pale than before, making his freckles stand out. Before, I had to be close to him to even notice them. All of his changes were subtle, just like it had been when Simon turned into a vampire, but the overall effect was noticeable.

David's stance was different. He stood up straighter and it made him appear more confident. The expression he wore was completely blank, though.

I accessed him in the space of a couple seconds. I couldn't afford to let my guard down; the others were not in sight and I had no idea what David was going to try to do to me.

As it was, he just stood there, looking at me intently, watching my every move as my hands travelled to my waist to where my throwing daggers and seraph blades were. I didn't dare go for my bow since, at that close of a distance, it would have been ineffective.

He was the first to speak. "Alec. I'm not the enemy. Allow me to explain everything to you." He called to me, raising his hands slowly into the air.

That's when I noticed my siblings, along with Clary and Simon, creeping back around to the front of the house.

I didn't want for them to surprise David and for him to see them as a threat and attack. With his vampire senses, though, I knew it was highly likely that he had heard them before I did.

"David. I need you to remain still." My eyes bored steadily into his. "One move and you will be dead before you even register it. My friends are coming around to join me, now. You can say what you need to say to all of us."

As I said that, I could see the others hurrying to my side, weapons dawn. I could tell Jace was just itching for David to move so that he could have an excuse to kill him.

To my growing surprise, David stayed completely unmoving and calm as we made a semi-circle around him.

"I promise I won't try anything, but we need to leave or someone will notice I'm gone." David said. Actually he almost pleaded the request.

Jace and I locked eyes for a split-second. That was all that was needed to come to a consensus. Before anyone else could react, Jace threw two daggers- they, of course, were blessed by angelic power- that hit each of David's feet and immobilized him.

Once I saw that he was down, I leapt forward and bound his hands and legs with a thin, pliable blessed metal that was used to restrain downworlders. I was nice enough to make it so that he could walk, albeit only in small strides, without the metal burning him. I wanted to hear what he had to say, but I didn't trust him. Not when the people I cared about were there and could get hurt by what could be a vampire trying to trick us.

David was obviously not happy with our little arrangement, but he didn't say much and chose instead to walk somewhat ahead of Jace, who couldn't seem to resist giving him a shove every now and then.

I tried to call Magnus but, once again, there was no answer. I was beyond worried. It was now almost 10pm. I decided to call Pablo since I was clearly desperate.

"Hello, young Nephilim. I think this is the second time you've called me in only two days. I didn't realize we were so close."

"Pablo." I said, ignoring his comments. "Have you seen or talked to Magnus lately? He's not answering his phone."

"What? I thought he was supposed to be with you by now?" Pablo sounded considerably more serious, now. "He told me earlier not to bother him tonight, because he had a date with you, bro."

"When did you talk to him last?"

"About 6pm. A warlock requested him to do a job. The guy, like, begged me to get Magnus to do it and no one else. Said Magnus was the only one who could."

I didn't really know what to do with that information, so I pressed on. After some prodding I got the name of the warlock, a former regular client of Magnus' by the name of Elijah, but Pablo didn't know any of the details. I hung up with him after getting him to promise to call me if he heard from Magnus.

We arrived at my apartment eventually. I let David sit down on the couch, which was an awkward affair because I wasn't about to remove or alter any of his restraints. Still, we all watched him intently, as if he was going to start attacking at any minute.

David addressed me and mostly ignored everyone else, except to give their weapons a weary looking eye occasionally.

"I have a relative who is a vampire… an ancestor, I guess you could call him. He's my grandfather's grandfather." David laughed humorlessly, pausing for a moment before continuing. "My family was killed by a demon. I thought it was some huge dog or something at the time, but it was just too weird and it moved too fast to be something as normal as a dog."

David looked up at me and into my eyes. "I ran and hid after I saw that thing ripping my father and my little brother and sister apart." He lowered his head. "I saw everything, too. So much blood… everything… spilling out of them. I knew if I stayed, I'd have been dead too, but I know I'm a fucking coward for running. Not fighting. I don't even know how I got away, really. Guess I was just lucky." Another bitter laugh.

"After that I just wondered around different parts of the city. I didn't have many friends, so I'm sure I wasn't missed when I never showed back up at school. I found abandoned buildings to sleep in at night."

David seemed like he was just getting warmed up in his story, but Jace felt the need to interrupt.

"I don't want to come off as rude, bloodsucker, but what the fuck does this have to do with what's going on right now? And I find it funny that you never gave us the name of this vampire gramps of yours."

I could see how David might misconstrue Jace's words as rude, but well, he did have a point or two, there. All eyes turned to David again.

"I'm getting there, I promise." He squeezed his eyes closed for a second. "I found that building one night, the one you saw me coming out of. I was trying to get in and I got spotted by the former vampire leader, Raphael. He and some other vampires circled me and would have probably killed me or something then, but my relative was with them and recognized me.

"They say he's odd, for a vampire. He keeps tabs on his family, although he never makes contact with any of them. He just watches them. He saved me that night and countless others because he was constantly protecting me from the vampires."

I finally spoke. "So you're saying you lived with them for a year as a mundane?"

"No. My relative, Benjamin's his name, helped my get a job and I found somewhere to stay more permanently. Anyway, Benjamin saw me talking to you through a window that day you first saw me outside of the Dumont, Alec. He said he needed me to follow you and he used faery smoke on me, but the stuff doesn't always work as intended. He never told me why he wanted me to do it, though."

"When did you become a vampire?"

"Monday. Benjamin had already gave me his blood prior to that. He was coming after me to kill me when I was on the phone with you." David's eyes narrowed. "I didn't want to become a vampire, but he made me. And he made me go along with what the Seelie Queen wants, too. I just only managed to get away."

David lapsed into silence and nobody spoke for a few minutes.

Simon looked around at the group. "So, does anybody else think he's bullshitting?"

Clary shook her head. "I don't know. He sounded truthful, but I don't think we should trust a guy who admits that he's been working for the enemy."

"We have to take him to the Institute, Alec. They will figure out what to do with him." Izzy said to me.

I agreed.

I called my mother to request the conclave meet to talk to David and discuss what to do with him. She sent out some shadowhunters to help transport him to the Sanctuary of the Institute, even after I assured her I had it handled.

Since there would be a meeting that night that would probably continue on into the morning and beyond, I decided to spend the night at the Institute.

I left a note for Magnus on the dining room table, in case he returned. Every time I thought about where he might be and why he was not responding, I got a very bad feeling in my stomach. I had pending obligations, but I had to find him to make sure he was ok. There was just nothing I could do until I had some information to go on.

Jace and Clary waited for me to get a few things to stay the night at my old home. Before I left I went into my office to grab some of my paperwork that I had been working on from earlier.

On the way to the Institute, I suggested that Clary call Luke and invite him. I called Pablo and invited him, as well. I figured, the more trustworthy downworlders there, the better. Nephilim tended to be pretty harsh when punishing the other races, and I wanted everyone to get their fair share to tell their sides of the story.

* * *

About an hour later, we were all stuffed in the Sanctuary of the Institute since that was the only room that a vampire could enter into. For once, my dad was actually present at the meeting. As inquisitor, his role was more focused on dealing with shadowhunters who broke the law, not downworlders. Still, his opinion on things were held in a high regard in this matter.

David's apparent willingness to expose the faeries and vampires motivated a lot of Nephilim out of their beds and away from their hunts. There were so many people there, no one seemed to notice or mind the four underage shadowhunters in the mix.

At my insistence, Pablo and his group of warlocks were allowed to sit in on the meeting, as well. For I some reason, Luke had been a no-show. I wondered briefly why he was missing, knowing that Luke was probably more than interested in hearing what David had to say.

For one terrifying second, I imagined that Luke had maybe gone missing like Magnus, but I scolded myself for jumping to conclusions and tried to keep my thoughts to the task at hand.

At that moment, the task was to listen to David retell his story that I had already heard. Instead of zoning out, I listened closely, wanting to see if I would catch David in a lie.

But he told the same story as earlier, although he didn't dwell on the part about losing his family to a demon.

David ended by saying that everything he did was against his will and that he would help the Clave bring the vampires and fae down in exchange for his freedom.

Jia called immediately for a vote on the matter. This, of course, was not met with a consensus. We spent the next 15 minutes arguing amongst ourselves.

"We have to do something. We have nothing else to go on." Someone said.

"How can we ensure that he won't turn on us? This could be a trick." An older female called out.

A bunch of responses rang out to answer that, but my father's voice was the loudest. "We won't know for sure. But we do have to act, and act swiftly. I say we hear him out without promising him anything."

"Ok. We will hear what information he is offering, then we can decide where to go from there." Jia said. "All in favor?"

All hands raised for this. A male shadowhunter walked over to David and began questioning him. I assumed that was the guy who dealt with downworlders who broke our law.

"I can get you into the place where they meet. You won't find it, or be able to get in without my help." David responded when asked what information he had for us.

"Surely, that can't be all you have for us?" Jia asked. "What assurances can you give us so that we know you are not leading us into a trap?"

David seemed to falter at the question. "I don't know. You can keep me restrained, I guess. Take me with you. I give you my word that I'm not trying to trap anyone. I was just a mundane less than a week ago." David's voice had gotten louder. He sounded panicked.

I didn't know how I felt about this. I didn't have time to think about it right then, though. Simon came up to me at that moment and jerk his head toward the door. I looked next to me and saw that all my friends were gone. I took one last look back at David and then slip out of the Sanctuary with Simon.

Once we were in the hallway that led to rest of the Institute, I asked Simon what he wanted.

"Luke's here with some pretty interesting news."

I stopped short and grabbed his shoulder. "What is it, Simon?"

"I think you'd better just hear it from him. They didn't even explain it all, anyway, before Luke told me to go get you."

We went into the kitchen where Luke was there with Clary, Izzy, and Jace. There was one more person in there, standing almost as if she were hiding behind Luke.

"Kaelie, right? What are you doing here?" I asked. I looked around at the others for help. "What the hell is she doing here? She's loyal to the Seelie Queen."

Luke started to say something, but Kaelie cut him off.

"I was loyal to the Queen and everything faery once, but that is mostly because there is no other way to be. My lady- I mean- the Queen controls everything in our way of life. There is no room for disobedience, no matter how justified one feels they are in their mutiny."

She took a deep breath and appeared to try to calm herself.

"The Queen has been working on improving faery smoke. She wants to make it more stable and more powerful. In order to make it, she takes certain substances from the people's bodies. That she does with the help of a warlock. In order to test out the effectiveness of the smoke, she tortures people with it to see what it does to them. She has been doing this with her own kind. I find it sickening."

"Kaelie ran away from faery a couple weeks ago. She took some other faeries with her, the ones who are against what their Queen is doing. And some of the ones who were being targeted by the Queen. She came to me for help and to offer assistance to the Clave."

"Well, there's a newly turned vampire in there offering the same assistance. Let's just take her to the meeting and her tell her story, as well." I said.

Kaelie hesitated. "How do I know the Clave will not just lock me up? You treat all of my kind as enemies, on sight."

Luke answered. "Just explain to them. I will do whatever I can to help you. If they take you away, I will continue to help your people."

Kaelie nodded.

I looked at her. "One more question before we go. Who is the warlock that is helping the Seelie Queen?"

"Warlock Elijah."

* * *

 **So now Alec knows that Magnus is being held by the fae and vamps...**

 **BTW I have finalized my chapter outlines so I now know there will be 5 to 6 more chapters and then we're done!**

 **Thanks for reading, y'all!**


	13. Chapter 13

**Hello there. As always, thank you for reading.**

 **This chapter has more violence than any of the previous ones, I just want to warn in case anyone has a problem with that.**

 **Please enjoy!**

 **I don't own TMI**

* * *

That little bitch of a warlock, Elijah was hovering over me as I regained consciousness. I had no idea what time or even what day it was. I felt almost as horrible as I did the first time I woke up in captivity. I felt that same magic-overpowering drug in my system again. This time, though, my injuries were faded to the point were I only felt minor aches. And my mind was not as foggy.

Also, I was in a different room and strapped to a cold metal table. There was a weird looking mass of labeled IV drip bags hanging on wheeled stands to my left. Elijah stood between me and the drip bags and was looking pretty smugly at me.

"Are you enjoying yourself, oh high warlock Bane?"

"Not really, no." I said. My voice sounded weak to my own ears. "What the hell is that stuff?"

"Hmm. You mean to tell you don't know." He placed his index finger to his temple and cocked his head in mock-contemplativeness. "Now, how is that possible? I thought you knew it all. How could someone as powerful as yourself be so, so painfully ignorant?"

I sighed inwardly. This scrawny little prick was just dying to get under my skin. I didn't want to get caught up in his games, though. I needed to stay focused so that I could figure a way out of this mess.

I heard footsteps approaching, but I couldn't lift my head well enough to face the source of the sound.

"Elijah." Came the sharp voice of none other than the Queen of the faeries. "I told you to attend to the werewolf. Why have you been bothering the our guest?"

The phrase 'our guest' was really throwing me off. I was sure that not everyone tied up and drugged their guests after kidnapping, roughing up, and also tossing them into stale, mold-infested rooms.

I kept my mouth shut though since I wanted to see how Elijah would respond. He was such a worthless little whiner.

"I only said something because he woke up." He slunk over to the other table in the room. I had to assume Maia was tied to it since I couldn't see it properly.

"You know very well how I deal with insubordination." The faery said in a quiet and dangerous voice.

"Sorry, my lady." Elijah said. He sounded at least a little bit sarcastic as he addressed her as such, but she made no further comment to him.

She turned her attention on me, instead. "Magnus Bane. I am so happy that you are awake. I know you cannot be all that happy with me right now, considering the position you are in, but I think you will see things my way in due time."

That bitch was obviously crazy. Still, I continued to hold my tongue. I could see as clearly as she could that my position was, in fact, not the best one to be in.

"I don't need to tell you about the injustice that the shadowhunters have done to my people. I know you have strange ways and have had rather questionable acquaintances and bedfellows in the past, but I do hope that I can persuade you past that, Magnus.

"I will be direct. I need you on my side. I come to you because you are the best. This smoke business has just been dreadful. I have been having to deal with incompetent allies and those of questionable loyalty. With you, Magnus, I believe I can finally formulate the most effective smokes and get rid of the rift raft."

While she talked, I tried to subtly watch Elijah. He looked murderous when she said I was the best, and when she said that bit about the rift raft at the end. I wondered what she had over him, seeing as how he could overpower her if he really wanted to. But, then again, Elijah was a pretty weak-minded individual and he was lazy; it was probably easier for him to just fall in line.

I finally started to negotiate.

"I've never been one to be comfortable strapped to tables, or to being prodded with. Let me out of these restraints, and then maybe we can talk." I said, trying really hard to sound more confident than I felt.

Her pale blue eyes narrowed slightly at me and I was reminded just how much the faery queen and I did not like each other. I'd never really had a problem with most faeries; I'd partied with them, dated them, even became friends with a few. My issue was solely with the woman staring at me. She was so deceptive, and while I never was one to show all of my cards, I preferred people who were a bit less manipulative.

"You insult my intelligence, Bane. I cannot release until I know that I can trust you."

"Oh, please. You'll never trust me. Just like I, for damn sure, will never trust you."

From as much as I could tell, I was making her angry. That truly wasn't my intention, but the Queen of faery was very hard to please.

"Warlock, you will help me, and I will not have you beaten daily. With your weakened state, I am sure that you could not last very long."

"Do your worst, then. There is no way in hell I would ever stoop as low as to ever help you."

Suddenly my cheek stung. I looked at the faery and saw she was brandishing what looked like a moss covered vine.

"That is but a taste of what you have in store if you try to deny me." She said haughtily.

Damn. That hurt. "You won't win. You didn't, when you sided with Sebastian. You're a smart enough woman, but you don't know everything." I really needed to shut up, but I just couldn't help myself, I guess. Against my better judgement, I smirked up at her. "You must have grown accustomed to wanting the very things that you can't have."

I watched from the corner of my eye as her arm raised again, this time lashing me across my chest. Then another two across my legs. I could feel the vine, with its thorns, digging in to my flesh. I knew she had drawn blood.

"I think you are remembering things incorrectly, Bane." Her breath was short and her voice hard. "Any change of heart yet, or do you need more persuading?"

I didn't respond to that. More than anything, I didn't want to show her any weakness. I knew my voice would probably betray me, so I kept quiet while I tried to get used to the pain.

And it was quite painful. For the next 20 minutes or so, the head faery used her whip-like vine thing to try to goad me into giving up my resolve. She didn't leave much of my body untouched as her whip came down again and again. Each strike she made, seared into the flesh and muscle of my arms, shoulders, chest, stomach, thighs, pelvis, and legs. She was nothing if not thorough in her administrations.

At one point she called Elijah over to have me breathe in more faery smoke and to tighten the straps that held me down. He looked absolutely giddy as he pulled the restraint at my chest so taut that I could barely inhale properly. And I was already pretty breathless, as it was.

More than anything- more than the pain, since this was not the first time that I had been held down and tortured by some sick maniac, unfortunately- I was humiliated. And I was sure that that was what she was aiming for.

Although I hadn't screamed or made much noise beyond a few drawn out groans, my eyes were tearing up. I wouldn't say I was crying, exactly, but she had lashed my face twice. Once, right across the bridge of my nose and the other time right on my mouth. Whether I was crying or not, though, the end result was the same and I knew I looked pathetic.

"Are you tired yet? Or do you want me to continue to work on that face that you pride so much." She said, voice full of arrogance. "Pride can be a man's undoing, Bane. Don't make that mistake."

In my head I was formulating what I wanted to tell her about her pride and her own undoing, when there was a loud commotion coming somewhere from my right.

"What the hell is going on, faery?" Someone spit out.

"Benjamin!" The queen sound shocked and exasperated. "I thought you are your subordinates had other business to attend to at your hotel?"

"I left David in charge, here. Where is he?"

"I do not keep up with your vampires. Surely you know that by now."

"He was supposed to be here and keeping an eye on you. I see you just went along with your plan for the extra warlock. You are not the one in charge here anymore!" The guy shouted.

There was another sound coming from a different direction. From my position I could see a group of faery knights emerge from a doorway. They probably heard the argument and came to help their lady.

There was a brief and silent standoff and then, all at once, a rowdy argument broke out.

I couldn't catch most of the words. I was suddenly more aware of the effect that the smoke was having on me. Again, I was feeling groggy and weak. I had no idea what they had done to Maia, if anything. I just hoped she and I wouldn't get caught in the crossfire if a physical altercation came about.

Suddenly, I felt myself being moved. Someone was roughly undoing the belts that had been holding me down and I was being shoved back into the room I woke up in on my first night there.

I took a few moments to catch my breath, although even the most minor of movements was painful. When I could I leaned over onto my side. I saw Maia slumped over in a corner, unmoving.

"Magnus Bane."

I flinched. The faery queen was in the room with me.

"What are you doing in here?" I asked through blistered and bloodied lips. "You would let them fight while you hide out with the prisoners?" I could here a racket going on outside of the room.

She glared at me for a second. "You are feisty, I will give you that. Maybe a bit too stubborn for my tastes, but I think we will learn to work together."

"I'm still not going to work with you."

"You enjoyed the pain, then." She smiled wickedly. "Fine. That is fine." She turned, as if she was going to leave, then turned back to me again.

"Did you ever stop to consider that I can reach out to a certain shadowhunter at any time of my choosing?"

"What are you talking about?" I had to force my words out. My chest and mouth were feeling so sore and I seriously needed to rest.

"David. He has been fraternizing with what used to be your plaything. That self-righteous shadowhunter called Alec Lightwood."

"Leave Alec out of this you filthy bitch."

She moved in closer to me and pressed her fingers in to a welt on my chest, near my shoulder, causing me to squirm back from her touch.

"You have always been a weak one, Bane. It is no wonder that I cannot stand you. The mighty warlock still has feelings for the silly little Nephilim who trampled all over his heart. And all over his dignity."

She leaned over me and smiled again, looking a trifle unhinged. Her red hair was fuzzy and frazzled and I shuddered at the crazed look in her eye.

"You will join me, Magnus Bane, or the Lightwood boy will be invited in and you will watch me treat him with the same hospitality that I have shown you."

The faery straightened up and before she left she said, "You have a until morning. When you wake, you must tell me your decision. It would be wise if you choose to not disappoint me. Again."

And then she turned and left the room.

* * *

 **A/N**

 **So... the faery queen is a total bitch, right? She was a bitch to write too. It's like, get a name, asshole. I hope I didn't overload you all with all the pronouns I used (she this, she that), but I hated having to call her queen all the time. You knew what I meant, right? And I was gonna just make up a name for her, so I researched names for like 15 minutes, but then I got bored. oh well.**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	14. Chapter 14

**So the next chapter is probably going to be Magnus POV at first, then switch to Alec's. The action is more with Alec right now. I don't want to just keep rehashing torture scenes between Magnus and the Seelie Queen because tha's boring and it tears my heart up to hurt him that way.**

 **I'm sooooooooo tired, but I hope this chapter makes sense. I can't really promise much, though '-'**

 **I don't own TMI**

* * *

The first thing I did once Kaelie told me that Elijah was working with our enemies was panic. Pablo had said that Magnus was supposed to meet with Elijah. I came to the only conclusion that made sense to me: Magnus had been kidnapped (or worse, but I could not think like that).

I followed everyone back out to the sanctuary since Pablo was there anyway and I needed to talk to him. When we got there, a group of shadowhunters were leading David away. I saw my father talking to the counselor.

"Jia, Dad. What just happened? Where are you taking him?" I had interrupted what looked like a very intense discussion, but I couldn't be bothered to wait around.

Robert gave me a strange look. Jia answered.

"He will spend some time in the Bone City. It will give us more time to deliberate, although this meeting is over until tomorrow."

Luke came over and did some interrupting himself. "Counselor Jia. I have someone- a faerie- who has very helpful information for us."

Jia looked like she was trying hard not to looked too shock, but no one could really mistake the exasperation in her voice. "A faerie? Are you kidding me?" She pinched the bridge of her nose. "So, you mean to tell me we have a vampire and a faerie- both, in one night- who want to negotiate with us?"

"This faerie is not loyal to the Seelie court, or the queen any longer." Luke responded.

"Well, who is it?" Robert spoke up, gruffly.

Luke hesitated for just a moment. "It's the rep for the faeries, Kaelie. She came to me for help, actually."

Jia and Robert both looked like they wanted to either throttle Luke, or spit on him. Jia spoke first.

"Another faerie that can lie? She is half-faerie, right?"

"Yes, but the vampire can lie, too, you know. So can everyone here. Why is everyone always so hung up on that? Even for the faeries who can't lie, you know that they are still more than capable of being deceptive, anyway." Luke sighed. "She came to me for help because she has a group of faeries rebelling against the Seelie queen. I asked her to talk to the Clave, to help us."

"Ok. I will see her, but alone. I don't think she will get a fair shake in front of this crowd tonight."

After Jia, Luke, my father, and my mother left for the Institute's office (my mother was listening to the conversation and she and my dad had inserted themselves into the meeting that Jia was having with Kaelie), I went to find Pablo.

I was pretty pissed at myself because I had actually forgotten about Magnus while I got distracted with the business with David and Kaelie.

Pablo was on the steps outside, talking to that pink, shimmering warlock when I finally caught up to him.

"What did Elijah say he wanted with Magnus, earlier?" Somehow, I managed to ask that question without freaking out.

Pablo rolled his eyes as he turned to face me. "Look, I told you everything I know. Maybe Magnus just wants to be alone. He's been like that a lot lately, since somebody broke his heart."

I chose to ignore the obvious dig.

"No you look, damnit. Elijah is working with the faeries. Magnus has been kidnapped."

Pablo's eyes got big and he gasped, but he couldn't seem to find anything to say. The pink warlock grabbed his arm and spoke. "Track him, Pablo! What are you waiting for?"

At that, Pablo looked even more apprehensive. "I did that earlier, actually. It was after you called me, Alec. It didn't work, though."

"What the hell?" I exploded. "You couldn't track him and you just chose to go pretend everything was alright?"

"I didn't know. I thought maybe he just didn't want to be tracked, or something."

I was running very short on patience, but I didn't want to take it all out on the stupid warlock. Not yet, at least. I took a deep breath in an attempt to get my frustration under control.

"I didn't even know you could make yourself untraceable." I said.

"Only warlocks. Well, faeries do it too, I guess." He looked like it was a real challenge to think that hard.

I threw my hands up, turned, and walked a couple steps back towards the Institute. I really needed to hit something and I didn't want it to be Magnus' best friend.

Luckily, at that moment Luke came out of the front doors and walked up to me.

"Jia wants Kaelie to address the Conclave in the morning. They are not going to lock her up like they did with David, but they have her under guard. She can't leave here until after she speaks."

"Does Jia believe her?" I asked. I wanted to get back to discussing Magnus' whereabouts, but I was curious about everything else that was going on.

"I think she does. But her story goes against some of the things the vamp was saying."

"Well, ok. We've got another problem. Magnus was kidnapped. Elijah called Pablo earlier for a job that he only wanted Magnus to do. Now no one can find him."

"Shit!" Luke glanced at me briefly and shook his head, the glint in his eyes resembling something that could almost be amusement. "It is always you and your little group that everything happens to, isn't it?"

I barely registered his comment. "What do I do? Apparently he can't be tracked. I just don't know what to do." Even I could hear the panic in my voice, but I couldn't do anything to stop it.

"First, go talk to the guy in charge of the downworlders. After that, get some rest. Everyone will regroup here very early tomorrow. If you went out searching now, you'd probably be more of a liability than anything else."

I tried, in vain, to calm myself down. I needed a clear head if I was going to be any help in finding Magnus. "Ok." I said. "Thanks."

Pablo took a step towards me to, but I just walked away before he could say anything.

An hour later I was back in my old bedroom, lying on the too small bed and trying to will myself to fall asleep. I had talked to the other shadowhunter about Magnus. He confirmed what Luke had said. We would decide what course of action to take in the morning after hearing from Kaelie and again from David. We would probably end up letting David lead us to where the missing downworlders were.

After I talked to him I found Jace and Izzy and informed them on all the new updates. They tried to comfort me, but I, of course, just wanted to be alone.

That was how I found myself in my lonely, dull room. The room that I had grown up in. It really hadn't changed in all the time since we moved here from Idris. Maybe that was because I never really felt attached to it the way other people seem to be with their rooms. I didn't really decorate or personalize the space at all.

If you didn't count the time that I had slept there, I'd spent more time in the library growing up than in my bedroom. And even though I lived alone in my current apartment, it didn't feel this isolated, and I just couldn't shake the loneliness that this room emitted.

This was probably very bad for me, because all I could do was think about Magnus. The night that I had been fanaticizing about ever since we had agreed to work together on our relationship turned out so ridiculously different than what had actually unfolded.

I decided to do what I usually did when I couldn't sleep; I started making to do lists for the next few days.

I got up and went to the little desk in the corner. I had thrown my things there earlier.

That's when I noticed at purple notebook under all of my papers. It had glitter on it.

There was no words or anything on the front so I opened the cover. In writing that was unmistakably Magnus' was a dedication to me that read:

 _To my Alexander,_

 _I hope you read this and find me_

 _The parts of me that you have been looking for_

 _The_ pieces _of me that_ _I h_ ave _been hiding_

 _The elements of me that you may not like or agree with_

 _The fragments of me that_ _I have wanted to shield you from_

 _Yet,_ _I give this to you_

 _In the hope that you read this and find me_

 _All of me_

 _Yours forever,_

 _Magnus_

Well, I was beyond intrigued and my heart began to pound with excitement. Was this what he meant when he said he wanted to work on something earlier?

I flipped through the pages quickly to see how much was there. The little notebook had most of its pages written on. I have no idea how Magnus wrote that much in such a short amount of time, but I was definitely excited to read it.

I could tell that it was not done. The last sentence on the last page was interrupted right in the middle. In the margins were a lot of scribbled notes where Magnus reminded himself to go back and rewrite or to elaborate.

Maybe excited weren't the only words that described how I felt. I also felt apprehensive and sad. I wished I was reading it under circumstances that did not involve me not knowing where Magnus was and if he was ok.

I also felt bad for reading it since it was obvious that he wasn't done fixing up on it, but I couldn't put the book down.

When we got out of this mess, he was just going to have to forgive me for being so curious.

* * *

The next day I found myself arguing with almost every member of the Conclave.

The meeting was scheduled for 7am. I had only gotten about 3 hours of sleep because I was up reading the notebook that Magnus had written for me.

Maybe staying up had made me cranky. I was already pissed at Pablo, but there he was, invited, along with his friends into the meeting again and all because I had insisted upon it yesterday.

Pablo was actually agreeing with everything I was saying. Like, aggressively so.

Like, for instance, there was a near consensus that we should allow David to take us to the Hotel Dumont at nightfall. I still didn't trust him. No one, besides my siblings and the downworlders there, would listen when I said that going to the hotel was probably a trap. Pablo insisted that everyone should listen to me. He actually stood up, walked over to stand near me and repeated himself a few times just to be sure, I guess, that everyone could hear him clearly. I just glared at him.

Everyone else just seemed to be ready for some action. They were ready to run headlong into a situation that they were rather arrogantly sure that they would come out on top of.

Even hearing what Kaelie had to say did nothing to change peoples' minds. I think that was mostly because she didn't offer a solution or an immediate course of action that they could follow.

Before the meeting could end, I found myself standing up in front of the whole congregation, telling them exactly how shortsighted, unintelligent, and cocksure they were all being.

Pablo had the audacity to stand up and say I was 'totally right, bro.'

Ignoring Pablo, Jia said that she thought that I was just being overemotional and strongly suggested that I sat the mission out.

The meeting adjourned around me, with people going off in different directions. Some went home to rest, but most went patrolling or went off to try to gather any more intelligence on either the vampires or the faeries.

I just stood there, feeling like I'd been slapped. I didn't think it was intentional, but I couldn't help but feel like the term 'overemotional' was being used in place of 'gay'. I didn't feel like I was acting differently than any other person in my position would.

After what felt like only a couple minutes of reflection, Jace hit me on my shoulder.

"Are you alright? You've been standing here for almost 10 minutes." Jace said quietly.

"I just got dismissed in front of everybody for being too damn gay."

"I don't recall anyone saying that, Alec."

"Jia might as well have said it. I'm gay, so my opinion must count for less than everyone else's."

"I don't know about that. Maybe she just thinks that you aren't thinking straight because you're so stressed about Magnus. I mean, come on, you just bitched out the entire Conclave. You've never done anything remotely close to that before." Jace smiled a bit hesitantly as he finished speaking.

I stared at him for a couple seconds before smiling a little, as well. "Ok." I conceded. "It felt good, though."

Jace slapped me on the back. "Of course it did. Now come on, princess. We need to make a plan."

Since the Institute was crawling with shadowhunters that did not expect to include us in their plans to go to the Hotel Dumont that night, we decided to go to my apartment.

I had convinced Luke and Pablo to join us all there.

Once we were seated, I spoke.

"David is probably going to lead them into a trap. I think we need to go there, too."

"I totally agree with you, Alec. You're so right not to trust David."

I looked at Pablo with a mixture of exasperation and a little bit of incredulity. "Will you please stop agreeing with me so much?" I asked as I dragged my palm slowly down my face.

He frowned a bit, but didn't say anything. His eyes looked sad.

Damn.

"I am probably more mad at you than I should be, ok. You were easy to put the blame on. I should apologize for not considering that Magnus is your best friend and that you are just as worried about him." I said, thinking that maybe I had been acting overemotional lately.

Pablo nodded. He looked up at me suddenly and smile widely. "It's cool, bro. I do feel guilty about sending him to Elijah, though."

"Maybe we should put the blame and the guilt aside, for now. We need to figure out what to do tonight." Luke said.

Simon spoke up. "I say we just go in after they go with David. That way they can't stop us."

Jace nodded. "Then we can come in a save their ass, yet again."

"That has become a thing with you guys." Luke said.

"What about Kaelie? Did they let her leave after she spoke?" I asked since I had not paid attention after the meeting.

"They sent her with some shadowhunters to get some of the other 'faerie rebels', as they called them, to go to the hotel, although Kaelie refuses to go inside." Izzy said.

Luke spoke again. "Kaelie says the hotel is not the place to find answers and that going there will be for nothing."

"Yeah, the real place to go is probably that foresight building that we saw David coming out of." Clary said.

I turned to Pablo. "Can you help us tonight? Can you get us into the hotel and then maybe into the foresight building?"

Pablo nodded and said that he could. He would be bringing his three warlock friends.

Luke also promised to come with some other werewolves.

We were all determined to come away with our missing friends and loved ones that night.

* * *

 **Thanks for reading!**


	15. Chapter 15

**I don't own TMI**

* * *

As soon as the Seelie queen left out of the room, one of the lumps on the floor moved. More like, the lump popped up like a daisy. A daisy with a spring in its stem.

"Elijah forgot to drug me!" Maia said as she raced the incredibly short distance to where I lay, nearly passed out, on the floor. She stopped short when she got a good look at me. "I knew she worked you over, but you look worse than I thought. Can you heal yourself?"

I didn't say anything for a moment. I was so tired and in more pain than I had been in a while.

I finally spoke. "Please, I can barely blink right now. But I've had worse." I lied to her, although we both knew she wasn't buying it. "Don't worry about me."

"They didn't drug me. I have to take advantage of that. I have to leave as soon a possible. I heard one of the vampires saying something about David leading the shadowhunters into the hotel Dumont tonight. That can't be good. I have to get out of here while I still have the energy to fight back."

"You won't make it without my help." I reminded her.

"But you can't even do anything. You said so yourself. Magnus, I can't let their slip up go to waste. I have to try. You never know, I might get lucky."

I was all too ready to just close my eyes and drift off, but what this new information meant that the situation merited expeditious actions that much more.

"Maia, if anyone finds you outside of this room, they may torture you worse than what they've done already. They might kill you." My words were coming out so slowly. I wanted her to understand me, but my mouth was still swollen.

"I am not underestimating them. If I don't do this, like right now, so many will be kidnapped or killed. You might think it is impossible for me, but I have to do this, Magnus. And I'm also worried about Bat and the rest of these people here. Being passed out for days can't be good for them."

"Then give yourself the best shot at it. Let me help you."

Maia looked at me questioningly, but nodded.

I reached my hands out to hers. "Give me some of your strength. I'll take the spells off of this room and the building, so you can get out. Once I do that, I'll return it to you."

Maia sucked in her breath, but only nodded once again.

I took her hands. It was hard to not think about doing this a while ago, back on the East River, with Alec. He had done it so selflessly. At that time I hadn't wanted to take too much. This time, I also didn't, but for different reasons.

One reason was that we needed Maia to be as strong as possible in case she had to fight and she was already at a weakened state, as it was. I had no doubt in my mind that she would probably end up fighting anyway, because once she got out she would help the shadowhunters.

Another reason was because I didn't want to heal myself too fast. If the queen of the faeries came back in, she would see that my magic was stronger and just get Elijah to drug me or smoke me out again. And probably go at me with her whip again.

As it was, my energy was so low and my injuries were bad enough that I worried about draining Maia just to get the little energy that I needed to remove spells from this building.

Luckily, the process didn't take too long.

I made her wait until we were sure no one was lurking around outside our room. The guard outside was even gone. Then, Maia gave me a very careful hug and promised to come back with Alec to get me out.

Then she was gone.

I laid there on the ground, a bit more spent than before, if that was possible, but I wanted to give Maia as much energy as I could.

I could only wish and hope that she made it out without being spotted. The plan was for her to change into wolf form if she came across anyone. She would be more able to protect herself that way.

The plan for me was to rest up and hope that I was left alone until Alec, or hell, even Jace, could free me.

Of course, my plan was interrupted.

The door slammed open about 30 minutes after Maia had left. I thought it would be the Seelie queen, but, most unfortunately, it was Elijah.

I had been drifting in and out of a semi-state of consciousness, but he made enough noise to wake me up instantly. He stood there, just grinning at me for a second.

"Can I help you?" I asked him, my words coming out funny.

He laughed. "I doubt that very much. The queen wants me to move you. She's ready for your answer."

Ah. She wanted to know if I was going to betray the shadowhunters.

Elijah's grin fell a bit when I remained silent. "Well?"

"Well what?"

"What's your answer? Agree, or more torture?" His grin was back.

"I would prefer to just tell her, if you don't mind."

That fucking idiot had the nerve to grab a handful of my hair and yank. I just had to figure out a way to turn the tables on this fool. Nobody yanks my damn hair.

"Your answer, now." He growled at me.

"Tell her I said you bitches can choke on it."

That was met with a heavy punch to my jaw.

I passed out almost immediately.

When I came to, once I oriented myself somewhat, I realized that I was in the Hotel Dumont.

Sadly, I also realized that I was hog-tied and that the Seelie queen and Elijah were standing over me.

"What is your decision, Bane?" The faerie asked.

"I will never side with you." I managed, once I found my voice. There was definitely blood dripping down my face again.

"You say that now, little warlock." The queen leaned down to caress my cheek. The one that was clean. "I suspect you will change your tune very soon."

I swung my head out of her reach as much as I could. She exchanged a dark laugh with Elijah.

I heard footsteps and some shuffling.

The queen spoke to someone who had just entered the room.

"Ah. David. I have been expecting you. I see you have brought me a new guest."

It was hard for me to see from the position I was in, but a heavy weight was crushing on my heart. Before I could even see him, or hear his voice, I knew that Alexander was the guest she was talking about.

I forced myself over to my side to get a better vantage and sure enough, there was Alec. His shirt was ripped almost completely down one side and there was blood all over him. I couldn't tell if it was his or someone else's though.

He was being forced into the room by David. David, who had his filthy hands on Alec, the vamp's arms wrapped around his neck and waist from the back.

I wanted to hurl.

The queen cackled with obvious glee. "Warlock, make your decision. You join me, or your Nephilim dies."

David's head snapped up. "You didn't say anything about killing him. You can't do that."

Hmm. At least he was on my side on that front…I guess…

"Do not argue with me in front of the captives. I must remember never to deal with vampires in the future." She said that last part mostly to herself.

Alec spoke. "Let him go. Just take me, but let Magnus go. I'll do whatever you want with no resistance. I swear by the angel."

"Oh. By the angel, you say? That means a lot to you Nephilim, does it not?" She seemed to think it over. "No. I need a warlock with his kind of power."

"You can use me as a bargaining chip with the Clave." Alec said, desperately.

I had to get him to shut up. What was he thinking, offering up himself to this pathetic trifecta of awfulness?

"No. You need a powerful warlock and you have one in me. I only need insurance that Alec be returned to safety and that he will remain safe." I said.

"I knew you would come to reason, Bane. You have my word that the little shadowhunter can skip along home." She leered down at me.

At that moment, though, David let go of Alec and sprinted, at an almost impossible speed, to the queen of fairies. He shoved her roughly against the wall.

"This is not what we discussed. I am betraying other vampires to side with you and you repay me by doing whatever the hell you want."

The queen looked quite shocked. I was very sure that she hadn't ever had anyone lay so much as a finger on her. She recovered well, although Elijah was muttering words and restraining David with magic within a blink of an eye.

I looked over to where David had left Alec.

He was gone.

* * *

 **Next chapter's already written, but I might wait until I make some headway into the following chapter before I post it. Maybe, idk.**

 **I hope you enjoyed reading! Thanks for doing so, as always!**


	16. Chapter 16

**I don't own TMI**

* * *

I couldn't believe I was standing in a room trying to avoid looking at Magnus. If we ever got out of this alive, I promised myself that I would never tell him- never let him get near a mirror to see- just how awful he looked tied up and discarded carelessly on the floor. He had bloody welts all over his body and face and his tattered clothes where barely recognizable. His was sporting a gash on his head that was leaking a bit of blood down one side of his face. And that was just what I could see from that angle.

I just couldn't take it, so I thought back to the events that led me up to that moment.

David had, indeed, betrayed the shadowhunters.

He had led them into the Hotel Dumont. We arrived just as the last of the shadowhunters were going in. One of them tried to turn us away when Maia, of all people, came running up to us like a bat out of hell. She looked very thin and paler than normal.

She doubled over to catch her breath for a second, gasping. "It's a trap. David- he's lying."

Luke lurched forward to grab Maia by her shoulders. "How did you escape?"

"It was Magnus. He was brilliant. They kept us drained and helpless at all times but he managed to do a couple spells to get me out. We had to warn you."

Hell broke loose after that. The shadowhunters that heard what she had said were shouting to the ones up ahead.

Through that chaos, vampires and faeries appeared and a battle was on- inside and outside of the hotel.

I ended up fighting a faerie. We went back and forth for a short while. I sensed someone watching me, so I let my eyes wander a bit. In the momentary lapse of attention, the faerie's sword briefly made contact with my shoulder, but it mostly just glanced off of it and tore down the side of my shirt.

Yes, I was stupid for letting myself get distracted because I could have been killed right then, but I did get to see that the person looking at me was David.

He was clearly trying to hide in the shadows and get my attention to draw me out. He was actually doing a pretty good job of it.

I was done playing with the faerie, then. I stepped forward to deliver a quick left jab, then put my seraph blade into his heart. I stepped over the fallen fae and began to walk to where I knew David was waiting for me.

Jace saw what I was doing and started to follow me. Unfortunately, we had to turned from David, as there were more faeries closing in on us.

Jace and I fought side by side. Clary and Simon we close by, fighting together as well. Izzy was a little further away, holding her own, as to be expected, with her whip.

By the time I glanced back at the spot David was previously, he was no longer there.

With the help of Pablo and the other warlocks, the werewolves, and the rebel faeries, our battle didn't last longer than 30 minutes. We were rounding up survivors and trying to get them to tell us where we could find their leaders and the ones that they had kidnapped.

In the confusion, Jace, Clary, Simon, Izzy, and I made a plan with Luke, Pablo, and Kaelie. We figured it would take too long to discuss with the others right then. They would just argue about what to do next. You know, shadowhunter politics and all.

Kaelie and Pablo were going to the foresight building. That was where Maia said Bat and the others were held. Kaelie explained that it was an ancient meeting place for downworlder allies.

The rest of us were going into the hotel to split up and find Magnus.

Most likely, he was in the other building, since that was where Maia had left him, but I couldn't help feeling that he was nearby.

Jace and I walked stealthily down the main hallways. We heard a sharp noise and naturally Jace charged ahead to follow it.

Just as I was going after him, a hand shot out to cover my mouth. My weapons belt was tugged from around my waist and my bow was yanked off of my shoulder. I was effectively disarmed at an alarming rate. I was then dragged down a side hallway and into a room. It was more than a little embarrassing that my efforts to fight back were extremely useless and probably went unnoticed.

That was how I found myself begging for the Seelie queen to release Magnus and to basically make a slave out of me.

For some reason, David was not on board with that. Once he snapped and focused his attention on roughing up the queen, I made my escape out the door and down the hall.

I knew where Magnus was and I felt guilty for leaving, but I had no weapons and I needed help.

Most inopportunely, David was on me again within minutes of escaping that room.

"You don't have to run, Alec." He pleaded with me. "I won't hurt you. I can protect you against the queen."

His arms were around me again, his body painfully pressed into mine, forcing me to remain motionless.

"We won already. You three are the last ones."

"I know." He shrugged. "I should have helped my people fight, but I had orders to bring you in. She didn't tell me she was just going to kill you, but I can change her mind."

I didn't understand David, at all. Why did he make it seem like I was so important to him? I asked him.

"Why do you care whether I live or die? You have to know that I'm never going to side with you after what you have done to Magnus and the rest of the prisoners."

I felt his body flinch when I mentioned Magnus' name. His face contorted into one of barely concealed rage. "I want you, Alec. I want to be with you, but you can't see past that damn warlock." He placed a hand under my jaw and pushed my face up in a gesture that he probably meant to be gentle. It was anything but.

"You belong to me. I will just have to make you see it."

I shook my head. "Magnus and I belong together."

His hand clenched around my jaw painfully. His eyes flashed. "I'll just have to take him out of the equation."

I did the only thing I could think of in that moment. I kissed him.

My lips touched his softly and he gasped.

Encouraged, I leaned deeper into the kiss. I moaned a little.

David responded by loosening his grip on my face and I could feel his body relax.

We stood there for another minute and I allowed him to get lost in the feeling of my body being up against his, my lips and tongue seeking to pleasure him. I heard him hum low in his throat.

I knew I would have just one chance at this, so I waited until I knew that David's focus on restraining me was completely gone.

I pushed away from him suddenly and used my fingers to jam them into his eyes as hard as I could. When he reacted to that (mostly in shock) I lifted my foot and forcefully kicked one of his kneecaps, then the other.

I knew that I couldn't do much damage, being weaponless and facing a vampire, but I'd surprised him so it gave me just enough leverage to get out of his grip and to get away.

I had to find someone with weapons.

Luck was on my side. Jace was turning the corner of the hall I was in. Jace saw me and sped up. He was carrying my belt and my bow.

I heard David behind me, yelling for me to come back. This time, he sounded angry.

I knew the vampire was scarily fast so I yelled at my parabatai to toss me a seraph blade.

I whispered 'Michael' to the blade. It lit up as I turned and slashed in one motion. I won't lie, my eyes might have been closed. Before I had moved, I could feel David right behind me, the hairs on my neck were raised up and I could sense every slight change in the air.

When I opened my eyes properly I saw two things: 1- David lay dead at my feet, burned and sliced through by the blessed metal of my blade, and 2- Jace, standing over him, crouched down as if to make sure he was truly dead.

He looked up at me. "Where did you go?"

"David grabbed me and took all my weapons." I said quickly as I started back up the hall to where Magnus was, Jace at my side, as always.

We stopped just outside the door. Jace handed me my bow and belt that he had found along the hallway.

"Magnus is in there. The Seelie queen and Elijah too." As I said that Luke and the warlock Angelo spotted us.

I filled them in, quickly on what had happened. We decided to just enter the room and hope to overpower the two inside.

The door was locked and I couldn't even get in with my stele. Jace and I attempted to pry our way in, but we weren't making any headway.

Angelo had been standing there in deep concentration, with a palm on the wall next to the door. "Wait. There is a powerful spell on this room." He said.

"Can you undo it?" I asked. I was trying to get emotions in check. I felt like I was so close to getting Magnus back. I didn't want to think of what could be happening in that room while we stood outside of it, trying to figure out how to get in.

"I just need to concentrate. I can see what he did. He made it almost impossible to bypass, but I am smarter than that." Angelo smiled and then closed his eyes for a few (long) minutes.

He got the door open 15 minutes later, and apparently it sapped him, because he sunk down to the floor, but waved us into the room.

When we went in, though, it was empty. Or so I thought, at first.

As I walked into the room more, I started to hear someone breathing laboriously. It had to be Magnus.

I followed the sound and it led me to him.

Magnus was still tied up and lying on the floor. He didn't see me and the others approach but he noticeably braced himself as he heard us.

I called out to him. "Magnus, it's ok." That was all I could get out without getting emotional, but that was all that was needed to make him relax.

I reached him first and carefully cut him out of the ropes that held him. As gently as I could, I helped him straighten his body out and lay his head on my lap. Someone conjured up a blanket for me to cover him with.

When his eyes found mine, he gave me a small smile. "I knew you would find me." He said before drifting off.

* * *

In the month that followed, the complete story of what happened slowly emerged bit by bit.

The vampires and faeries had planned on luring us to the Dumont and into an ambush. They hadn't planned on or noticed that Maia had escaped. Her last-second warning probably meant the difference between victory and defeat.

The queen wanted David to bring me in as leverage for Magnus to do what she wished. She didn't realize that David had feelings for me. I didn't even realize that he liked me as much as he apparently had.

No one really knew why the Seelie queen and Elijah left without taking Magnus with them, not even Magnus himself. All we knew was that they left in a hurry and Elijah had intended on Magnus being trapped in that room forever.

Unfortunately, we had yet to find the queen or Elijah and we didn't even know where to begin looking.

According to sources, they had left the US altogether and were not planning on coming back anytime soon.

The Clave, after some prodding from myself, my family, and plenty of warlocks and werewolves, decided to only punish those who were involved with Seelie queen and vampires of the Dumont, instead of punishing whole races of people for the actions of a few.

They weren't so lenient with our the Seelie queen and Elijah, however. A message was put out to the rest of the world that they were wanted dead or alive. There was even a six figure bounty placed on the two of them. And anyone caught allying themselves with either would be treated just as harshly.

If we ever did find them, they'd be given a trial and then, when found guilty, executed.

The victims spent this past month recuperating with the help of Catarina Loss and the Silent brothers.

Unfortunately, one of the kidnapped mundanes died. The other only barely made it. Everyone else, besides Magnus, recovered within two weeks after they were saved.

Magnus' injuries were the worst. He had taken the most of the Elijah's drug and the faerie smoke all in the shortest amount of time. It made sense though, since he was the most powerful, they needed to give him more to keep him sedated.

Magnus was finally at a point, though, where he was more healed than injured. Now, we were just being cautious. Catarina and I didn't want him to risk reinjuring himself.

Magnus, of course, was recovering in my apartment, although Kaelie had reversed the effects of the smoke from his apartment in Brooklyn. Angelo and Alondra had put Magnus' building back to normal. I tried to busy my mind so that I didn't have to think about Magnus' inevitable moving out.

I had just made it home from an early meeting with the Clave. We had been deliberating over the last of the trials with the faeries and vampires. I think we were all glad that as of that morning, all trials were done. Sentencing was another story, but we were getting there.

It was only 10am when I walked into the bedroom that I had been sharing with Magnus.

He was sitting up in bed and Catarina was talking to him. She looked up and smiled at me. "I was just leaving. I cleared him to go back to all of his normal activities." She pecked Magnus on his cheek. "Just don't over do it, ok?"

Magnus rolled his eyes. "Oh, I'm getting out of this apartment and doing everything today. You have no idea how boring this has been."

I found that to be offensive. "Hey. I thought you enjoyed having me wait on you 24/7? I guess I'm boring, then."

"Sweetie, you're not boring. You just won't let me do anything. And you won't do anything fun to me." Magnus' eyes bored into mine with an intensity that I was sure I was matching.

The sexual tension between us had been over the top. I mean, we had been sleeping in the same bed for a month. As Magnus recovered, we had done a lot of touching and kissing, but not much beyond that.

At first, I was just relieved when he finally let me kiss him. He had been so ashamed of the extensive damage that had been done to his face. That first night in my bedroom, after the Silent Brothers were done prodding him, he told me he was too ugly to look at. It probably didn't help that he couldn't heal himself nearly as fast as normal.

Of course, I had done everything in my power to tell him that it wasn't true, but Magnus was unyielding.

Instead of pushing too hard, I gave him space, at first.

After a couple days of him sinking slowly into depression, I had to intervene.

After that I held Magnus, and kissed him as much as possible. I told him that I loved him no matter what he looked like and that he was beautiful regardless.

I walked over to the bed and planted a kiss on Magnus' lips. He reached up and wrapped his arms around my neck to stop me from lifting away from him.

I pulled my head back a little to look into his eyes before dipping back in to claim his lips again. I wanted to climb in bed to get a more comfortable angle, but then I remembered we had company.

I pried Magnus' lips and arms off of me and turned to address Catarina again. She was smiling fondly at us.

"I'll leave you guys to it, then." She laughed softly. She lowered her voice so that Magnus couldn't hear. "I'll see you later." Catarina scooped me into a brief, but warm hug and then showed herself out.

When I turn back to Magnus, he was still giving me those sex eyes. "Join me."

"I seem to remember you saying how ready you were to get up and get going."

"Well, I changed my mind when you kissed me."

"That's flattering, but I'm sure you remember your appointment at the spa in a couple hours with Izzy and Pablo. After that, you, Izzy, and Clary have a hair appointment and then that mani-pedi thingy."

His eyes lit up. "Oh yeah. Thanks again for all of that."

"You're welcome. I wanted you to be able to get out and have a fun day since you've been cooped up in here all this time." I smiled at him. "So get up. I brought you some breakfast. Its on the kitchen table."

Magnus practically jumped to his feet and planted a kiss to my temple. "Thank you, sweetie. But won't we be apart all day?"

"Yes. I think you can stand not being around me for a few hours, Magnus. Besides, I'm taking you on a date tonight."

"Oooh, where are you taking me?" Magnus clapped his hands and jumped up and down a couple times. I couldn't help but laugh at his eagerness.

"It's a surprise, but I promise you're gonna love it." I pulled him close and kissed him slowly. As I pulled back, I caught his bottom lip with my teeth and tugged lightly. "Then we'll come back here and I'll have my way with you."

Magnus made a noise in his throat that was a mixture of a hum and a moan. "You can't say and do things like that and not expect me to rip your clothes off right now."

"Sorry. I'll be good. But you should really get ready."

Magnus reluctantly pulled away and went to get showered.

* * *

After Magnus finally left, I scurried over to the Institute. I know I told him we were having a date night, and we were, but I was actually throwing a party in his honor.

Call me sappy if you want, but I knew I had to do something to show my appreciation once I heard the full story of what Magnus had endured while he was held captive. And how he risked himself to get Maia out to be able to prevent the ambush that had been planned.

Besides, Magnus was having a tough time being a homebody now that he had the will to go out and resume his normal, busy life.

Before I knew it, it was time to pick him up. We taxied back to the Institute and Magnus gave me a funny look complete with a cocked eyebrow once he saw where we were.

"Darling, what are we doing here?"

I got out of the cab after him and paid. "We can leave whenever you want, but I think you'll have a good time." I pulled him close to me and inhaled his scent. "Trust me, ok?"

Magnus smiled. "Ok. Let's do this."

With that we went inside and into the rarely used ballroom.

Everyone was already there. By everyone I meant every one of Magnus' friends and acquaintances that I could get ahold of -I had Pablo and Catarina help me with that- and every shadowhunter who wasn't homophobic and/or anti-downworlder and who actually wanted to thank Magnus and the rest of the downworlders who helped solve our most recent conflict.

Magnus looked around. There was a bar set up in one corner with a faerie and a warlock serving drinks and food. Around the perimeter were tables and chairs for those who wanted to eat or relax. Most people, however were standing and talking, some even dancing, in the middle of the huge dance floor.

"You shadowhunters threw a party?" He turned to look at me.

"Actually, I planned the party." When he didn't say anything I added, "For you. Well, for you and everyone who helped us against the Seelie queen and the vampires."

Magnus' eyes were practically bugged out. "You threw a party? And this is not some stuffy, high-class affair. This actually looks like something I would willingly go to."

I raised an eyebrow of my own at him. "I know you think you're complementing me, but I'm actually offended that you think I my party would be a 'stuffy, high-class affair.'"

Magnus' shoulders shook as he tried, unsuccessfully, to hold in a belly laugh. I just glared at him.

Catarina and Pablo came up to us at that moment. "What's so funny, bro?" Pablo asked as Catarina pulled Magnus and I in for hugs and kisses.

Magnus was still chuckling. "I just can't believe my little shadowhunter managed this party. And all without any of you telling me."

"I'm finding that Alec is rather intense when he wants to be." Catarina said, although she was smiling. "He was very clear when he said he wanted you to have a fun-filled day and for the party to be a surprise."

Pablo nodded. "And I've seen him mad, dude. I didn't want to make him mad again."

Magnus just laughed some more, wrapping an arm around my waist.

I frowned. "You guys do see me standing right here, don't you?"

For some reason, that made them all laugh.

At that moment, my parents joined us. Robert spoke first.

"We probably won't be in attendance long as you kids will undoubtedly have more fun without us, but we wanted to thank you, along with everyone else who allied with us." He put his hand out for Magnus to shake.

Magnus shook his hand and gracefully made no comment about the fact that my father was just a baby compared to all the years Magnus had on him. Eh, parents. What are you gonna do?

My mother congratulated Magnus on his recovery, actually giving him a one-armed hug and awkward pat on the back.

Next, Luke, Maia, and Bat, along with some other werewolves came over to talk. Eventually my siblings, along with Simon, Clary, and Jocelyn joined us as well.

As the night wore on I did notice that most of the older shadowhunters exited. Left behind was a younger crowd and downworlders who liked to party hard no matter what their age was.

At a certain point, someone turned the music up full blast and the dance floor filled up quickly. Magnus snapped his fingers and the room turned dark with disco balls and moving, multicolored spotlights everywhere.

Magnus was having a great time, mingling amongst his friends and dancing and drinking like there was no tomorrow.

He held out his hand to me and cocked his head to one side. "Dance with me, Alexander?" He asked.

I simply could not say no to him.

The music was fast and wild. I mostly just stood there, moving only a little and feeling like a total asshole. Magnus was the polar opposite of me, of course. He moved all around me, shaking and gyrating his hips, rolling his body and grinding against me, all while looking sexy as fuck.

He put his hands on my hips and turned me around, pulling my ass against his groin. "Just relax for me, baby." Magnus whispered in my ear. I felt his breath on my ear and neck and it send very nice vibrations all down my body.

His hands were on my chest from behind and he pulled my closer. We swayed together until I relaxed and I even started rolling my hips against him.

Pretty soon both of our breathing was labored.

The song changed to something with an even faster beat. I turned around.

"Let's go home."

"I think someone's feeling naughty."

I yanked him closer to me and reached around to grab his ass while I kissed him possessively.

Magnus leaned into me and wrapped his long arms around my neck.

I pulled back from him although he was still seeking out my lips. "Naughty? You have no idea." I smiled slyly at him.

After that Magnus practically dragged me around to say goodbye to everyone and leave.

The cab ride back to Queens was pretty steamy. We had just enough willpower that the scene did not turn explicit. I was very sure that the driver was happy for that.

I paid the guy and we walked as quickly as we could to the apartment door.

Once inside, instead of being all over me like I thought he would be, Magnus immediately went to the couch and plopped down.

I went over to him and narrowed my eyes in concern as I studied him. "What's wrong?"

"I'm just a little tired, babe. I should be okay in a few minutes." He leaned his head back and his eyes drooped heavily.

"I think you had too much excitement today. Too much grinding on the dance floor, maybe."

He lifted his head up to look at me and smiled weakly.

I leaned down and scooped him into my arms, bridal style. I took him into the bedroom and laid him on our bed.

He started protesting, but I could tell he needed rest. I took his shoes off of him, followed by his silk pants and shirt. After I got undressed and into bed next to him, I pulled the covers over us.

I stared at his face for a while before I turned the light off. Even a month later, I still found it hard to believe he was ok. He was safe.

Everything was alright and we were together again. My heart felt so light and so heavy at the same time.

It felt light because I was so happy. I was truly happy with him. It felt heavy because love like the one I felt for Magnus carried a certain weight. I carried it happily, though. I found that there was not much I wouldn't do for him and our relationship.

I reach over to turn the lamp off and kiss the sleeping love of my life before closing my own eyes, pulling Magnus' body close to mine, and following him off to sleep.

* * *

 **I'm 2 thousand words into the next chapter and I hope to post by tonight, or tomorrow.**

 **Thanks for reading!**


	17. Chapter 17

**Please enjoy :)**

 **I don't own TMI**

* * *

The sun was shining in my face, breaching my closed eyelids. I woke up just enough to magic the curtains closed.

I heard a familiar, quiet laugh and then the sun was back on my face again.

I hesitantly opened one eyelid half-way to see Alexander standing by the window with his arms folded over his chest.

"I'll just open them again so you might as well give up."

I closed my eyes and attempted to roll over to my stomach.

Alec made it to the bed fast as hell to yank the blanket off of me. He must have been wearing a rune for speed or something.

"You're not funny, Alec. It's cold in here." I whined at him.

"Get your lazy butt up." He chuckled.

"But it's so early."

"Actually, it's late."

I gave in and sat up. "Did you go somewhere earlier?" Alec was wearing a white button-up and fitted black jeans.

"No, but I have been waiting for hours for you to wake up. I wanted you to get plenty of rest, but you've been asleep for 13 hours." Alec's eyes traced over me, looking concerned. "How are you feeling?"

I threw my arms over my head and arched my back in a nice stretch. "I feel great. I'm sorry I fell asleep last night." I said, a little sheepishly.

Alec smiled a bit. "That's ok. I'll make sure you make up for it."

I held out a hand out to him. "Let me make it up to you right now."

His smile fell. "Later, I promise. We ha-"

"Please? I miss you, Alec. I want you."

"I know. Me too. It's just that Pablo's here and I have another surprise for you."

"What the hell is Pablo doing here?" I asked crankily. I didn't want to entertain anyone but Alec, at the moment.

"Hey! I heard that!" Pablo called from the living room.

Alec pulled me out of bed. "Just put some clothes on. I'll explain everything to you and I promise you will love this."

I frowned/pouted at him, but did as I was told.

When I came out to the living room, Pablo and Alec were talking in front of an opened portal. "What's this about?" I asked them.

Alec smiled at me. "We're going on vacation. Pablo made us a portal."

"Oh? Where are we going? For how long?"

Pablo answered. "Do you remember that island I told you about near Cancun? That's where you're going. Alec asked me to make the portal since you've never been there."

Oh. That was a surprise, indeed. The island was actually created by Pablo and his friends during a rather hectic time of civil unrest in Mexico a century ago. They used the place as a refuge for the families of revolutionists who were being hunted and murdered in the most gruesome ways. A warlock could only make a portal to the island if invited.

Once that had cleared up, they used the place when they wanted to escape somewhere that only a few people could follow.

I had been lost in my thoughts for a couple minutes so Alec took it upon himself to thank Pablo and pull me towards the swirling portal.

"Send me a fire message if you need anything, but I think I have everything set up for you." Pablo said.

With that, we walked through.

Once we reoriented ourselves on the other side, Alexander and I both stood in awe at the beauty of the island we had to ourselves.

We had landed right in the middle of the white sand of the beach. The water behind us looked so clear blue and inviting. About 30 yards ahead of us was lush vegetation and palm trees. Ahead of that was what looked like a miniature hacienda-style home.

The air was warm and moist and there was a gentle breeze flowing through our hair.

I looked at Alec. "How did you do this? How did you get Pablo to let us come here?"

Alec shrugged. "I just asked him for suggestions on where to take you for a vacation. He offered us this place." He smiled at me. "We can stay for about two weeks. That's as long as I could convince the Clave to let me stay away from work."

"I love you." I found myself saying him before kissing him.

He responded to the kiss immediately, wrapping his arms around my waist. Before we could get too far, I had to ask him a question.

"Alexander?"

"Hmm?" He asked, his fingers playing with the collar of my shirt.

"This might sound silly, but we never really talked about it much after what happened." I paused as I tried to figure out how best to put it. "Will you be my boyfriend?"

Alec's eyes lit up at the question. "Yes, of course. I was going to ask you that same thing, but why is that silly?"

"Well, it's not silly, but it just seems like something we should have talked about before now."

"We should have." He nodded "Now, let's check out the house. There's a surprise in there, too."

We walked, holding hands, to the building. He had had Pablo set this place up for us, and given him instructions on the things that we would need while here.

Once we got inside, we looked around, but I didn't see any surprise. When I asked Alec, he smiled and said it was in the bedroom.

Said bedroom was located on the second floor and it was as beautiful and simply designed as the rest of the house. I noticed that there was a king-sized canopy bed of red lace smack in the middle of the room. It looked just like the one I had been using in his apartment back in Queens.

I pointed to it. "Is this the surprise." I asked him.

Alec was rambling through the draws of the night stand. He pulled out a small bottle. He gave me a look that made me suck my breath in sharply.

"There's no surprise. I just wanted to get you into the bedroom." His voice was deep and sexy.

He closed the distance between us and began to push me toward the bed.

"How sneaky. I should punish you for that."

"You should. But later. I have something I need to do first."

I rolled my eyes at him in disbelief. "Are you seriously trying to put me off again?" Was he messing with me?

"No." He kissed my neck. "It's not that." He sucked on my earlobe. "I just want to do some things to _you_ first."

With that, Alec stopped talking and pulled my shirt over my head. After that, I helped him unbutton his shirt and I pushed it off his shoulders and on to the floor.

Staring into my eyes, Alec unbuckled his belt and jeans and let them drop to the floor, kicking them away. I couldn't pull my eyes away from him. He smirked at me and reached over to discard my pants, as well.

We made our way over and into the bed, drawing the red curtains around us once again. I was reminded of the time, a month ago, being in a similar situation, but this time Alec was on top of me and he was fully awake.

We were kissing feverishly. Our hands were exploring and reacquainting themselves with each other's bodies after so long of a break from touching this intimately.

The only problem was that Alec was angled so that his bottom half was next to mine. Therefore, I wasn't getting any friction and he was holding my wrists in one hand in a vicelike grip.

"Alec." I whined at him.

"What? Tell me what you want from me."

"You have to touch me. Or let me touch you."

"Is that all? You just want to touch."

"Yes. I mean no. I want to fuck you. I want to fuck you right now."

He shook his head. "Sorry, but I'm fucking you." He said. And without a trace of a blush, at that.

He leaned up on his knees and pulled aside the curtain to grab the bottle of lube he had got out earlier. That's when I saw it. On the tops of either of his thighs were stamina runes.

He smiled when he saw me looking at them. "I'm not sure if we'll be leaving this bed for a while. Now lay back and let me take care of you."

Alec popped open the bottle and coated his fingers with the lube. He place his index finger at my hole and rolled it around a few times, never breaching.

I tried my best to speed him along, by attempting to press myself onto his finger, but he simply was not to be rushed. Alec was nothing if not patient. I was pretty much the opposite.

After a minute or so, though, he pressed his finger inside of me, slowly, as he leaned down and sucked on the most sensitive skin of my inner thigh. I hummed in relief. Just that was enough to make me moan a bit. It had been so long since I had had sex.

Soon he added a second finger, stretching me carefully and slowly. He switched sides so that he was licking and sucking on my other thigh.

I could tell he was purposely avoiding my prostate, but when he added a third finger he barely grazed it. I threw my head back against the pillow and moaned.

What he was doing was not nearly enough to get me anywhere near coming, but it was driving me crazy as hell.

"Alexander. Fuck me."

I squirted some lube into my palm and waited for him to kiss his way up my body.

To pay him back a little, I went as slowly as I could while slathering the lube on his dick. He bit his lip and grunted as I squeezed him roughly. "Fuck me." I said again.

Alec shoved me back down to the bed and grabbed my ankles to yank me down towards him. He had topped a few times before, but he was never this rough and commanding. It was such a turn on.

Alec placed the tip of his cock at my entrance and pressed in an inch, holding my hips down and stopping me from driving upwards. He stared down at me and wiggled his eyebrows.

"I hope you're feeling rested." He fingered one of his stamina runes and actually winked at me. "I can go for hours."

This boy would never stop surprising me. I couldn't help but marvel, once again, at the ways that Alec had grown and matured. I was beyond ecstatic to find that that growth and maturity extended to the bedroom.

Alec plunged into me into quickly and began thrusting right away. All breath must have vacated my lungs because I couldn't breathe or make a sound for a few seconds.

It was just the beginning and already, Alexander felt so good.

He was clutching my hips and fucking me hard. It was almost poetic how he could move so slowly within me, yet be so forceful in his strokes. This man radiated so much power, so much control.

I could feel Alec's blue eyes all over me. All I could really do was hold on to his hard biceps and take it.

"Look at me." Alec commanded in a husky voice.

My eyes snapped open. I had been only vaguely aware that they had been closed.

"Is this okay, baby?" He asked, concern evident in his eyes and voice, although he didn't falter in his thrusting.

I responded with a moan and by moving my hands behind him and running my nails down his back.

"This is perfect. Don't ever stop." I whisper to him.

Alec leaned down and kiss me sweetly, bringing his hands up to frame my face. "You're perfect." He said seriously, as he rammed inside of me even harder.

I was digging my nails into his back fiercely. Everything about Alec was just making me wild. The sweat that had formed on his skin somehow always made his scent even better. His voice was so deep and raspy with the lust that was reflected in those damn blue eyes.

And through it all, he was pounding into me so hard that with each push, my head was getting closer and closer to the headboard. Yet, his hands on my body were so gentle. Each running of his fingers through my hair, each caress, tender and loving.

Alec kept that up, softly kissing my chest, neck, and lips while pumping into my ass steadily and relentlessly.

After some time though, he was pulling out. He lifted my hips and placed a large pillow underneath me. He reentered smoothly, lifting my knees and legs up and over to one side.

Alec leaned up on his knees and pounded into me at a faster pace.

"Alexander…" I murmured.

We had never done that position before, but I was liking it. It gave him so much leverage and power and he was wielding it to perfection.

And we stayed in that position for long time, with Alec going to work inside of me. I could feel the bed shaking, hear the springs squeaking, and the headboard knocking against the wall. I couldn't do much more than moan out in one long note as he assaulted my prostate just about every third stroke.

Alec must have been paying close attention to my reactions because he just seemed to know when to increase the intensity and when to back off in order to keep me in a constant state of pleasure, never quite reaching my peak.

He started fucking me faster and harder, hitting my spot every time now. My body was convulsing, my toes curling, and the words I was forming were little more than gibberish.

Just when my release was near, Alec was pulling out again.

He sat back and pulled me into his lap so that I was straddling him and he stroked my hair until my breathing slowed down a bit.

"I wish this didn't have to end." He said.

I responded by grinding down against him and biting his shoulder as a reaction to the intense pleasure of our arousals rubbing together. It was the first time he had let me have any control so I wanted to take advantage of it.

It didn't last long. He held me still while kissing and sucking at my neck.

"You're so fucking sexy, Alexander." I said.

He ground his hips up against mine sharply.

"Shh. Just be quiet. I'm not done with you."

He lifted me by my ass and slammed me back on to his dick as I cried out.

"I'm going to watch you ride my cock. I want to see you bounce up and down on me. Loose control on me, baby."

Before he even finished talking, I was already lifting my ass and dropping it back down on him, whimpering and moaning at the pressure that had been building up this whole time.

And Alec did watch me. He laid back against the pillows and eyed me as I fucked myself on his cock.

I heard as his breathing became more and more erratic and the muscles in his stomach, which my hands were all over, became tauter.

"Touch yourself." He breathed out to me.

I obeyed and immediately grabbed my own dick and started pumping myself.

Alec sat back up and squeezed my ass, controlling the pace of my movements.

Judging by all the wild breathing, the load moaning, the shaking, and the desperation in the way that we were clutching at each other, we were both close.

Just before I shot out I heard Alec shout 'fuck!' and he flipped us so that I was on my back again and he was diving into me at a pace that was almost inhuman.

I came forcible all over my stomach and chest moaning Alexander's name over and over.

Alec came about 30 seconds after me, shouting and grunting as he continued to thrust in and out at a leisurely pace until he came down.

I groaned as he pulled his rapidly softening length from me.

Alec pulled me into his strong arms. "Did I hurt you?" His eyes searched my face.

It took my a few moments to find my voice and even then, it was hoarse.

"Alexander, what you just did was the hottest fucking thing anyone has ever done to me."

I nuzzled his neck, then snapped my fingers to clean us up and to conjure us a cold glass of water.

After we drank the water we kissed lazily for awhile and talked in hushed tones about things of no particular consequence. Eventually, we drifted off to sleep, completely blissful and carefree in the knowledge that we were right where we needed to be: right there in each other's arms.

* * *

 **Finally!**

 **I had so much fun writing my first full-on smut scene! Lol! I hope it was good for you, too!**


	18. Chapter 18

**This is like a bonus/filler chapter. It's still Magnus POV and they're still on vacay. Enjoy!**

 **I do not own TMI**

* * *

Night had fallen by the time I woke up. Alec was still sleeping, but he was draped all over me, making it hard to extract myself.

I wiggled and squirmed for 3 full minutes, so as not to wake him. When I finally thought I was clear to get up, I felt his hand on my arm.

"Where do you think you're going?" He asked, while rubbing his eye with his other hand. How cute.

"To see about finding something to eat." I answered. "I literally haven't eaten all day." I placed my hands on my hips and stared at Alec pointedly.

He practically flew out of bed. "I am so sorry. I should have made sure you ate before…"

"What? Before you attacked me like the sex-crazed maniac that you apparently are?"

His cheeks flushed predictably. "Um, yeah. That."

I grabbed his hands and pulled him toward the bedroom door, laughing. "Come on."

Down in the kitchen Alec was next to no help. That was pretty surprising since he was normally a good cook and liked to do all the work.

I sighed at Alec, who was busy grinding up against my ass and kissing my neck while I was sautéing vegetables in a skillet.

"You are way too distracting, darling. Go sit down or I'll never get this finished. I haven't even added the chicken yet."

Alec took a small step backwards. "Maybe if you weren't trying to seduce me…"

I whipped my head around to look at him. "I am not. I'm really hungry and I just want to eat and go back to bed." I turned back to the stove.

Alec stepped back up to me and ran his hands over my arms and put his lips up to my ear. "Mm-hmm. I suppose you wearing nothing but those small, tight briefs is just a coincidence, then? You were wearing plain boxers earlier." He whispered to me.

Maybe I _was_ having some fun with him. I arched my back and wiggled my hips a bit. "If you behave yourself and help me cook, we can have some more fun later. K?"

Alec ran his hand over my satin-clad ass. "Promise?" He asked.

I just rolled my eyes and pointed to the refrigerator.

With Alec's help we got the meal to the table shortly thereafter.

We sat across from each other and he stared into my eyes so much, his fork missed his mouth a couple times. Being afraid that Alec would spear his lips, I sat next to him and fed him the rest of his dinner.

We did the dishes together and then scurried upstairs, where Alec took me again. Once again, we were in no rush to finish. This time, though, he made gentle, tender love to me, his arms wrapped around my chest from behind.

He whispered how beautiful I was and how much he loved me into my ear. All the light touches and tenderness was driving me crazy and I shivered every time I felt his breath run over my overheated skin.

Alec's tongue and lips painted my shoulders and neck as he gently nudged us up and over the climax for the second time that day.

* * *

The next day found Alec and I walking along the beach and talking. We spent the day that way, going in and out of the water, mostly just messing around. We splashed each other with water and then had sand castle building contests.

Later on that night, I conjured us a bonfire complete with beer for Alec and wine for me. We made dinner together again and fell asleep quickly afterward.

The next few days went in similar fashion; Alec and I soaked up the sun and found (mostly silly) things to do on the beach, then relaxed at night, cooking together and feeding each other.

When we woke on the eight day, Alec frowned at me thoughtfully. "I never thought I would say this, especially when I have you all to myself, but do you want to go into civilization and mingle with some other people?"

I chuckled at him. "Already tired of me, Alexander?" I asked and got up to go shower.

He followed me into the bathroom, putting paste on his toothbrush. He caught my eyes through the mirror. "I could never get tired of you, Magnus. But really, Pablo told me about a village we could go to with all kinds of things that you and I would like to do."

"Ok. That sounds like fun. We could probably use more food, anyway."

"You know you could just snap your finger for food, right? And I don't get why you keep making us cook dinner. You could just snap for that as well."

"Yes, I could. But I guess I just like doing normal things with you."

As I started soaping up, Alec turned around and his eyes traced over my body with a smile tugging on the corner of his mouth.

"My eyes are up here, buddy." I joked.

His smile widened as he dragged his eyes up to meet mine. "That's fine. I love your eyes. I could stare at them all day."

I giggled. "That's so corny."

Alec shrugged. "It's true."

I had to hand it to him: he kept his eyes on mine. That is, until I started running my hands down my wet chest and stomach.

Alec moaned lowly. "You are not playing fair."

"Shut up and get in here."

Alec scrambled out of his boxers and into the shower.

I dropped to my knees and swallowed his cock almost immediately. Alec hummed his appreciation and placed his hands into my hair.

I bobbed back and forth on him for a couple minutes, enjoying how he tasted, before I pulled back a bit and stood stock-still and waited for his reaction.

He tried gently moving my head, but I wouldn't budge. I raised my eyes to look up at him, smiling around his dick.

That was all it took for him to start fucking my mouth. Alec was gentle at first, but then began to thrust with reckless abandon, moaning, yelling, and throwing his head back and all but coming apart at the seams.

I let him do what he wanted; I was more than capable of handling it and I wanted to see just how aggressive he would be with me.

And aggressive he was. Don't get me wrong, he was no where near violent or anything, but Alec was definitely very energetic and assertive in his thrusting.

He came in my throat and returned the favor eagerly.

We finally finished our shower and went downstairs for breakfast.

Alec made pancakes as I read notes that Pablo had left me about the location of the village we were going to.

After eating, I made the portal and Alec and I stepped through to a deserted jungle area in the middle of a quaint village.

We only had to walk a couple of minutes to make it to the town center. There were plenty of tourists and locals around, walking through the streets, talking, and just generally having a good time.

We wandered around for a bit before I pulled Alec into a clothing shop. I didn't find anything that he would wear regularly, but he willingly tried clothes on and modeled them for me.

I, of course, found plenty of pieces to add to my own wardrobe.

After that, Alec spotted an art gallery that we perused for a while.

We found a small shop for lunch and sat together at the counter, chatting with the owner of the place. She told us to call her mama Rosa.

"You two, are you together?" She asked with a big smile on her face.

Alec didn't say anything. He probably didn't know whether to be honest or not. I threw caution to the wind and answered affirmatively.

She smiled some more. "You make a very handsome couple." She said. "Are you coming to the parade tonight?"

"Maybe we will." I say, smiling at her.

"Do come. There will be all local artists, painting, singing, dancing, everything. All the restaurants along the street serve samples to tourists and later is a big block party. We dance and mingle all night."

Alec looked at me. "Can we do that tonight? Do you want to?"

We agreed to attend later and thanked mama Rosa, promising to see her later.

Since we would probably be out late we rented a room in a bed and breakfast for the night and set out exploring the town some more.

It turned out to be very interesting. Alec convinced me to come with him to a lecture a professor was giving that tied in Mexican and Native American history with modern times. I expected to catch up on my beauty sleep during, but I surprised myself and Alec by actually paying attention. I even asked a few questions at the end.

We went to our room for a couple hours to relax and get out of the sun, and, you know, make out.

After that, Alec and I had an early dinner and got a nice spot along the main street to see the parade.

There was a portion of the parade that was actually that: a parade. People on floats, or people just walking by and holding things, went past, displaying their art, or singing or even acting.

Once that had gone through, other artists set up spots for themselves right in the street and worked on paintings, drawings, and many other works. The crowd was free to walk around and view the work as it was being done.

Alec and I walked around for a while until we got hungry again. We found mama Rosa outside of her shop and she fed us sandwiches and Mexican beer.

By the time the block party started, Alec and I were both tipsy. We danced in the street with everyone else as the band played lively song after lively song.

Now that was my type of party.

About 3 o'clock in the morning, Alec and I stumbled into our room for the night, feet sore and heads spinning. The party was still going strong outside and our room did little to shut out the noise.

I considered portaling back to our island, but when I asked Alec what he thought, I found he was already asleep. It didn't take much for me to ignore the noise and fall asleep, as well.

The rest of our days on vacation was spent either holed up on the island, coming up with newer and more extravagant places and ways to get freaky with each other, and finding more villages and towns to explore.

All in all, it was a perfect vacation. We just had fun and reestablished our physical bond and strengthened our emotional bond.

Too soon though, it was time to go home and face reality. Luckily for us though, reality was looking pretty good, at the moment.

* * *

 **Thank you for reading!**


	19. Chapter 19

**Final chapter!**

 **I don't own TMI**

* * *

"Are you attached to this place?" Magnus asked, rather hesitantly, as he walked up and held me loosely from behind.

I had been standing in the kitchen, drinking my coffee over the sink, and in deep concentration.

"No. Not particularly. Why?"

"You seem sad. Or moody. Or something."

I finished my coffee and rinsed it, sitting the cup down. "I'm just thinking about everything." I turned around to face my boyfriend. "I feel like we're taking a huge step today."

"We've been living together for over a month now. It won't make such a big difference just because we're moving in to my apartment, will it?"

"Yes. You living here was out of necessity. It's not necessary for me to come live with you. In my eyes, that makes it a big deal." I shrugged. I felt like I wasn't making much sense.

"I understand that, Alec, I do." He paused and gently lifted my chin with his finger. "You still want to do this, right?"

"Raziel, yes. More than anything. I think I'm just worried that something will go wrong. I just want us to be together. Stay together. You know?" I sighed and rested my forehead on Magnus' shoulder.

"Don't worry so much, my darling. What will be will be. And we will be together. I won't let anyone or anything take you away from me this time. Not my own stubbornness, nor my pride, nor my stupidity. That is my promise, Alexander. " Magnus' eyes were soft in the early morning light.

I couldn't really think of anything better to say, so I just nodded at him. "Me too."

Magnus grinned at me and rubbed his nose against mine. "Well, I didn't wake up this early just to stare at your beautiful self. There will be time for that later. Let's get all this stuff to our apartment."

The next couple of hours were spent moving into Magnus' (our) loft. It would have taken less time, but Magnus kept trying to insist on doing it without magic (although he was not above 'borrowing' a truck from some poor mundane). I went along with it knowing that he would cave eventually.

And cave he did when, on the first trip up the stairs with a bulky suitcase, he broke a nail.

I couldn't hold back my snorts as I stood in witness to his impressive kaleidoscope of expressions. It went from concentrated determination (Magnus trying to wield my old hand-me-down rolling duffle with two busted wheels up the narrow stairwell), to mild annoyance (Magnus finding out that the bag's wheels were conspiring against him), to surprise (Magnus losing his grip and having to reach out and grab the duffle awkwardly to keep it from falling), to horror (Magnus discovering the dreaded broken nail), before settling on unbridled outrage.

Once Magnus shoved the bag away in disgust and kicked it back down the stairs with his ridiculously expensive looking shiny black dress shoe, I just about lost it.

"Shit!" He hollered. "That fucking hurt!" Magnus hopped up and down on one foot, while trying to maintain his balance and dignity.

I had been trying to keep my laughter down as I stood at the apartment door waiting for him, but I guess he heard me because his head snapped up.

"And you've just been watching me this whole time?"

"…Yes?"

"I'm glad I can provide you with entertainment."

"I'm sorry, but that was funny." I said, trying desperately not to laugh again. I didn't quite make it.

Magnus finally smiled at me. "Screw it. I'll just use magic."

I took his hands and pulled him up the stairs and through the front door.

"There's nothing wrong with using magic. You are a warlock, after all."

"I know, I know." Magnus groaned at me, pouting. "I just thought we could do this together."

"There are still plenty we can do together. We can unpack together and you wanted to redecorate, remember."

He smiled at me with shining eyes. "That's right. You always know how to make me feel better, sweetie."

I didn't mention how putting up with two temperamental siblings for most of my life trained me up for dealing with Magnus' mood swings, but I'm pretty sure that it was implied.

Once Magnus got done moving us in, I made him some lunch, gave him a back massage, and sent him off for a nap. He did wake up early and did most of the work, after all.

Having the afternoon to myself, I decided to go to the Instituted to see what Jace and Izzy were up to.

I was on the subway by the time I realized I had left my phone on the kitchen counter back home. Of course, when I got to the Institute Jace and Izzy were nowhere to be found.

I was about to leave, when I decided to check my mother's office. I could never keep up on her schedule since she was in Idris much more than New York.

The light was on and the door was half opened, so I just walked right in.

Right in on a meeting my mother was having with some vaguely familiar looking guy.

They stopped talking when I barged in, but not before I had heard my mother saying Magnus' name.

"Alec. What are you doing here?" My mother asked. For some reason, she looked guilty.

"What were you just talking about?" I asked, ignoring her question. My defenses were up.

I looked at the other guy in the room and finally placed him. He was the shadowhunter in charge of downworlders who broke the accords. Ronald something, I thought.

"Alexander. Please give us a moment to finish up here. I will speak with you in 15 minutes."

With that icily formal tone, she practically pushed me out of the office and closed the door in my face.

I paced around the hallway as I waited for them to finish up. I didn't really know what to expect, but I had a feeling it wouldn't be good. The intense looks on their faces and my mother's voice indicated that well enough.

"Alec. Please come in." Maryse stood at the door with her arms folded.

The guy's whose name might be Ronald brushed past me with narrowed eyes and a pissed expression.

"What is this about?" I followed my mother into the room.

She got right to the point. "There is a problem with Magnus' testimony."

"You mean inconsistencies, or something? They made him retell his story over and over all while he was still recovering and while the Silent Brothers were foaming at the mouth to study him like some dissected frog."

The Silent Brothers made it no secret that they studied the effects of the fairy smoke and the drug Elijah had invented from all of the victims, especially Magnus. They had been almost giddy with the discoveries they had made.

"You should have waited until he felt better an-"

She cut over my tirade.

"His testimony is not inconsistent. There are some who just don't believe everything he said. Or they think he's withholding information."

My first instinct was to yell at her. To deny that Magnus would do such a thing. I really couldn't, though. I knew from experience that he could and often did withhold information if he felt it was necessary.

He'd done it to me, although now, it was like I couldn't get him to stop telling me stories about his past.

Even in Magnus' notebooks that he was continuing to write for me, I'd noticed a theme that occurred time and again was issues with trust. Usually for good reason, too. So many people gotten close to him and broken his trust that Magnus probably felt that he had to protect himself.

He had done so, many times, in the form of keeping people at arm's length, and never giving away all of his secrets.

To tell the truth, I had also felt that something was missing when I'd heard Magnus' story, though. I still don't know why they chose to flee without him and spare his life. I didn't want to push the issue, though, hoping that he would tell me when he was ready.

"What do you think?" I asked her.

"I really don't know, but if he is not telling the whole truth, its probably because he's protecting someone."

I frowned at her. "He hates the Seelie Queen and Elijah. Why would he protect them?"

My mother sighed and rubbed her fingertips along her brow as if she was warding off the beginnings of a killer headache. "I don't know, but now is the time to come clean if you know anything about this. Anything at all."

I knew for a fact Magnus would not protect them, so I told her that.

"Alright, Alexander. If you say there is nothing to pursue, then I will relay the information to the Clave. Tell Magnus to confirm that with the person who will contact him shortly."

She looked at me closely before continuing. "We'd just better hope the Seelie Queen stays hidden and doesn't start causing trouble again."

I left in a daze. I had no choice but to go home and try to get Magnus to talk to me (once again) about his ordeal while being held captive.

I didn't look forward to it, by any means, but I was determined to just mention it and let him tell me if and when he was ready. _If_ there was anything to tell.

If there was, then Magnus and I would work together to get through whatever lied ahead of us.

The End?

(For Now)

* * *

 **Thanks for reading guys!**

 **That's the end, but there is a sequel on the way! I have no idea what it will be called yet, but I have already started to outline it and everything. Here's a spoiler (in case you were wondering) they will not break up in the sequel. The story will be about how Magnus' and Alec's bond is stronger than ever and they will bring the Seelie Queen and Elijah to justice. This one will most likely be 3rd person cuz I want to explore the characters from a different perspective.**

 **(CORNY ALERT! SAPPY ALERT!) I am so happy with the response that I got to this story! This is the first thing that I have written and actually finished in almost 10 years! (Seriously, around the 9th chapter I was in tears thinking I wouldn't be able to put this all together.) It makes me sooo very happy that some people actually like this story because I have a hard time sharing things with others, so thank you for giving me a place to express myself.**

 **Feel free to let me know if you have any questions about this story although some things were left unresolved purposely and will be addressed in the sequel. Just write a review or, as always, send me a pm. :)**

 **Until then, read my other fic (please). It's called Welcome to The Downworld (m-rated malec, soon to be updated), and look out for my new AH AU malec fic that I plan on starting next week!**

 **xoxoxoxoxox**

 **-Jonnitta (cinkie68)**


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